LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



DDDCmHElbD? 




Glass 



Book^ 








THE 



MISSION AND MARTYRDOM 



OF 



ST. PETER 



" They (the alleged passages) speak for themselves in a way which 
those who are sincere in their inquiries after religious truth cannot 
possibly mistake ; those who are not sincere it would be hopeless to 
attempt to convince." 

Father JM^Coeey {in his Tract upon this subject, p. 11). 



THE 



MISSION AND MARTYRDOM 
OF ST. PETER: 



CONTAINING 



THE ORIGINAL TEXT OE ALL THE PASSAGES IN ANCIENT 

WRITERS SUPPOSED TO IMPLY A JOURNEY 

EROM THE EAST, 



frrafata & Ionra-<fat|Mit tarniento; 



THAT THERE IS NOT THE LEAST SIGN IN ANTIQUITY OF THE ALLEGED FACT, 
NOB, EVEN OF THERE HAVING BEEN A TRADITION TO THAT EFFECT. 



»ttf) $refaton> &atitt& 



THE REV. ALEXANDER M C CAUL, D.D. 

AND 

THE REV. JOHN CUMMING, D.D. 



BY 

THOMAS COLLINS SIMON, Esq. 

AUTHOR OF " THE NATURE AND ELEMENTS OF THE EXTERNAL WORLD. 



ELEET STREET, and HANOVER STREET, 




LONDON. MDCCCLII. 



2>S«- 



s vS 



5*^ 



LONDON : 

SAVILL AND EDWARDS, PRINTERS, CHANDOS STREET, 

COVENT GARDEN. 



I 



to 



DEDICATION 



TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE 

THE EARL OF SHAFTESBURY, 



ETC. ETC. ETC. 



My Lord, 

The Analysis which by your indul- 
gence now appears under the sanction of your distin- 
guished name, and which removes a grave modern 
misapprehension as to what is stated in our ecclesiastical 
records, respecting the scene of St. Peter's martyrdom 
and mission, has been drawn up in that same high 
cause of religious liberty and religious truth in the 
promotion of which your self-denying patriotism is at 
this moment so conspicuous ; and self-denying assuredly, 
in no ordinary degree, that patriotism is entitled to be 
considered which but few of your Roman-catholic 
fellow-subjects will not mis-judge, — but few of them 
being in a condition to discriminate between an hos- 
tility to themselves of which your Lordship is incapable, 
and hostility to the foreign Prince whom they obey 
(either openly or secretly — either as members of their 
own church, or as members of ours), and whose assaults, 



VI DEDICATION. 

however trivial in appearance, against the religious liberty 
of our land, or against that ecclesiastical authority of 
Her Majesty by which this liberty is protected, it is the 
duty of every British subject, at any cost of self-denial, 
to resist. 

As the error now indicated is admitted by all modern 
Roman Catholics to be a cardinal point of the present 
controversy between these Protestant Islands and that 
foreign Prince, there is good reason to hope that its 
thorough eradication, thus once finally effected, will 
exhibit to such of the Roman Catholics as dwell among 
us, the groundlessness of his international pretensions, 
and in various other ways also, materially contribute 
to our great Protestant object — the full liberty of all 
churches, and the security of our own. I need not say 
that if the effect upon our cause that I anticipate from 
this appeal to History be realized, I shall look back with 
renewed gratitude to the happy auspices under which 
you have allowed the. result of my researches to take 
its position among the exertions of those who in that 
loyal and enlightened cause shall have co-operated with 
you. 

I have the honour to be, 
My Lord, 
Your Lordship's faithful and 

Very humble servant, 

Thomas Collins Simon. 

London, Augmt, 1852. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 



Prefatory Notices , ix 

Introduction 1 

List of alleged Testimonies 19 

Part I. Antenicene Records 29 

Part II. Eusebius 144 

Part III. Postnicene Records 219 

Appendix *...-. 291 



NOTICE, 

BY 

THE REV, ALEXANDER M°CAUL, D.D. 

PROFESSOR OP DIVINITY IN KING'S COLLEGE, LONDON, 

PREBENDARY OF ST. PAUL'S, 

AUTHOR OF " THE OLD PATHS," " THE MESSIAHSHIP OF JESUS," 
ETC. ETC. 



Having been permitted to read the proof-sheets of 
Mr. Simon's Work, I have great pleasure in stating my 
opinion that it is a most useful review of an interesting 
topic of the Controversy with Rome, clear and intelligible 
to the general reader as to the controversialist ; and that 
its value is enhanced by the fact that Mr. Simon is a 
layman, who justly feels that the controversy is at least 
as important to the laity as to the clergy. The plan 
pursued of going through all the supposed testimonies, 
one by one, is very satisfactory and instructive. 

Alex. M c Caul. 



Rectory, London Bridge, 
Aug. 2, 1852. 



NOTICE 



BY 

THE REV. JOHN GUMMING, D.D. 

AUTHOE OF 
" FORESHADOWS," " APOCALYPTIC SKETCHES/' ETC. 



I have read several sheets of this work, by the kind 
permission of the Author, as they passed through the 
press. I am strongly persuaded it is one of the most 
able and searching investigations of the subject of 
Peter's relation to the Church of Rome, and alleged 
presence in the city of Rome, that have yet appeared. 
I do not agree with all the reflections of the learned 
Author, especially those in his Introduction; but the 
main object of the Treatise is discussed with a patient 
and exact research that renders his Work of no common 
value. 

John Cumming. 



THE 



MISSION AND MARTYRDOM 



OF 



ST. PETER. 



INTRODUCTION. 



1. Objects §c. of the Work. — At a period when the 
Ecclesiastical History of the First Ages attracts more 
than ordinary attention, it is hoped that an attempt to 
rescue from uncertainty and misrepresentation some im- 
portant particulars respecting the life and death of the 
Apostle Peter, as these are indicated in the Holy Scrip- 
tures, will not be without interest to the reading public ; 
especially as misconceptions, and consequent mis-state- 
ments respecting these particulars, and respecting what 
the Fathers say about them, have been lately put forward 
as the basis of an Italian supremacy in. this country. 

It would be an erroneous and most unjust view of 
the intention of these pages to suppose that they have 
been written in hostility to the Roman Catholics of 
Great Britain and Ireland, and to the peaceful exist- 
ence of their church among us. The exact contrary of 
this is the truth. One of my main objects in their pub- 
lication is, to place that large and important class of the 
community upon an easier and happier, because truer, 
footing than they are on at present, with regard to the 
other divisions of the Christian Church that subsist 
around them ; and thereby to augment as much as pos- 
sible, that religious liberty which they even now enjoy 
to a greater extent among us than we ourselves are 
allowed to enjoy at Rome. 

B 



2 INTRODUCTION. 

The shortest and easiest mode of effecting this is to 
show (since it can be shown) that the Roman -catholic 
church in our islands, although entitled to its freedom 
and to* its clergy, to its buildings and to its ordinances 
— as fully entitled to these by our glorious laws, as even 
the church of England herself is, — cannot with any- 
thing like historical or even traditional warrant, be used 
as an instrument for the temporal aggrandizement of 
the church that is at Rome, or of the continental sove- 
reign that is at the head of it. I do not say one word 
against the ordinances of the Roman-catholic church, 
from the first to the last page of what I have written. 
I only seek to show the members of it in Great Britain 
and Ireland, that they are wholly independent of the 
head of the same church in Italy : that St. Peter did 
nothing whatever, — nor, until the Reformation, was ever 
thought to have done anything for the Roman-catholic 
church in Italy that he did not equally do for^ the 
Roman-catholic church in Ireland and Great Britain; 
and that it is fully competent to the different com- 
munities of this church in every country in the world 
to elect their own head and to order their own affairs, 
without depending for these matters upon the will of 
any one country or sovereign which happens to profess 
the same religion as themselves. I only seek to show 
that the efforts made by an Italian sovereign to place 
himself at the head of all the Roman-catholic commu- 
nities in Christendom, and most of all at the head of that 
in these islands, have no foundation in history ; and that 
the story of the thirteenth century, upon which his agents 
still ground his claim, was never until now put forward 
in England as a true story, having been merely composed 
for popular amusement, by the same Roman-catholic 
archbishop of that period as wrote the other similar 
story of St. George and the Dragon. The native inde- 



INTRODUCTION. 6 

pendence then of the Roman- catholic church in these 
islands, is one of the main objects of these pages. In 
them I have done no more than set forth the historical, 
or as it is now-a-days termed, the traditional truth con- 
nected with that proposition; the inference from that 
truth being too easy to require any elucidation. I 
write, therefore, in defence of religious liberty in the 
largest sense of the expression — the religious liberty of 
the whole world — of Roman Catholics as well as of 
Protestants, — not only as far as this concerns the 
building of a church within the walls of a city, or the 
assembling of a congregation by the tolling of a bell, 
or the permission to possess whatever religious books 
may be deemed necessary, — matters now so intolerantly 
obstructed in some of the most prominent Roman- 
catholic states of Europe, — but also with regard to the 
creation, if necessary, of such ecclesiastical titles as shall 
avoid all confusion with the titles of other churches, 
with regard to the free right of each community to elect 
its own head, and with regard to whatever other means 
may be considered essential to the due exercise of their 
religion by the Roman Catholics of these realms. I 
may, however, be permitted to say that I am one of 
those who look forward to the time when it shall 
please the Dispenser of all good to enlighten our fellow 
countrymen as to the great fact that His word, however 
interpreted, is infinitely more precious than the word 
of its interpreters, and when we shall be thus enabled 
to congratulate both them and ourselves upon their 
happy, though long delayed, return into the bosom of 
His church. 

And the other object of the present publication, 
although more strictly connected with the Protestant 
church wherever it exists, will be found to be equally 
exempt from hostility to the religious liberty of the 
Roman Catholic. That object presents itself in the 

b 2 



4 INTRODUCTION. 

obvious check which the facts here, for the first time 
made known, will naturally exercise upon the importance 
attached by some of our Protestant clergy to the doc- 
trines derivable from the church that is at Rome, and to 
the ecclesiastical surveillance of the sovereign who is at 
the head of it. It cannot be denied that the very general 
though mistaken notion about one of our Lord's first 
twelve apostles having superintended in person the pro- 
ceedings of that church, and about a distinct expression 
or act on his part, authorizing this surveillance, has led 
many a conscientious Protestant, who was at first shocked 
at its innovations, to palliate them afterwards, and even 
finally to approve of them. When, however, it is now 
seen that that apostle's personal relations with the Italian 
church were but the same (in all respects exactly the 
same) as they were, for instance, with the church of Eng- 
land — that he never was in either of the countries, and 
that he never was bishop in or had his Chair in either 
church in any other than the vague and figurative sense 
in which these expressions are employed by the Fathers 
respecting his relation to all the local churches in the 
world — when this, I say, is clearly seen, we have good 
grounds to hope that the words of Scripture will again 
resume, upon the minds of all our clergy, the same un- 
resisted influence which they happily possessed until the 
learning and conscientiousness of our universities had 
been cheated of their birthright by a delusion into which 
we have seen that the learned and the conscientious were 
but too liable to fall. To disperse this delusion then, 
where it has gathered, and to guard against it more effec- 
tually where it has not, is the other of the two main 
objects which have induced me to undertake this analysis, 
the accuracy of which, fortunately for truth, none can 
from their education better estimate than this very sec- 
tion of those in whose interests it has been undertaken. 
All the present pretensions of the Roman clergy 



INTRODUCTION. O 

respecting the superiority of their church, will be found 
to resolve themselves into the single proposition that on 
some occasion or other St. Peter left the East. This is 
the pivot of the whole theory. Whether he was five- 
and -twenty years in Europe, or only a few days before 
his death, is looked upon by them as of little moment. 
The question is, Was he there at all? Now, it will be 
seen not only that this is not matter of history, but what 
is still more remarkable, that there never was even a tra- 
dition to this effect ; a fact which must astonish all who 
are aware of the confidence with which the Roman clergy 
have expressed themselves upon the subject. It will 
be seen that when, in the fourth century, a bishop of 
Rome professed to have just discovered the relics of St. 
Peter in the catacombs, it was then first conjectured by 
a Greek writer who had never been at Rome, that the 
apostle might perhaps have been put to death there. It will 
also be seen that a statement of his having left the East 
a good many years before his crucifixion at Babylon oc- 
curs, for the first time, in the fifth century, in a Latin 
translation from the same Greek writer; it being well 
known that this Greek writer never made such a state- 
ment, and admitted on all hands that this Latin transla- 
tion is a most unskilful and inaccurate performance, 
called by the Roman clergy "a labyrinth of error." It 
will be seen that neither the conjecture nor the mistrans- 
lation were ever afterwards alluded to as credible, or, in 
fact, alluded to at all, by more than about one writer out 
of every two or three hundred who wrote upon ecclesias- 
tical matters, and that there was never any other state- 
ment on the subject until the Reformation ; for that as 
to the story, called the " Golden Legend," invented in 
the 13th century, about the Learned Dogs and the Fly- 
ing Chariot, the scene of which is laid in Europe, and in 
which St. Peter is one of the principal characters intro- 



6 INTRODUCTION. 

duced, every one was aware from the first that this 
was a mere invention, like the other u Golden Legend " 
about St. George and the Dragon, composed at the same 
time and by the same writer : nor was there ever any one 
found until the period of the Reformation, and scarcely 
any one even since then, to defend these stories as state- 
ments of authentic facts, until this was attempted last year, 
for the first time, in two English publications. The evi- 
dence I have to offer on all these points is such as no Ro- 
man Catholic will refuse. I produce the original Greek or 
Latin text of all the authentic passages that have ever 
been adduced, accepting as authentic all such as have 
been ascertained to be so by the learned in commu- 
nion with the church of Rome, and I show that such 
language was never understood by the Roman clergy to 
admit of the sense attempted now-a-days to be forced 
upon it by a few of them, in defence of the great ecclesi- 
astical hypothesis under consideration. Unlike my pre- 
decessors, therefore, on this subject, who have all con- 
fined themselves to the historical inconsistencies of the 
hypothesis, and to the incompetency of the ancient wri- 
ters supposed to have entertained it, I deal merely with 
the alleged interpretation of the Greek and Latin texts 
referred to in these writers ; and of course, where neces- 
sary, with the alleged existence of such texts at all. In 
all cases I cite no other authorities respecting these texts, 
except the Roman clergy themselves, and such as they 
have thought proper to cite or to refer us to. So over- 
whelmingly evident, nevertheless, is the point to be es- 
tablished, that if it were not for the existence in our 
metropolis of an abundant library, accessible to every- 
body, and supplied with attentive and intelligent atten- 
dants, I should have seen little use in putting forward a 
mass of evidence so diametrically opposed to what is now 
the general impression in England — so diametrically 



INTRODUCTION. 7 

opposed, I may add, even to what my own impression 
was until my suspicions were excited by some remarkable 
expedients to which the two Eoman-catholic writers of 
last year upon this subject had recourse. At the library 
of the British Museum, however, every statement that I 
have made may be strictly tested. 

But, it will naturally be asked, how has it happened 
that so many people of all persuasions since the Refor- 
mation, should have been deceived by the propagators of 
the story into the belief that there did exist the tradition 
in former times? An abundance of circumstances ex- 
plains this. 1 shall here indicate a few of the more pro- 
minent of these ; but the share that each has had in the 
result can only be appreciated by those who are at the 
pains of going thoroughly into the whole subject. 1 . The 
existence at Rome of a book called " Peter's Preaching," 
during the apostle's lifetime. 2. The mistranslation of 
Greek words and passages by some modern, and even by 
one or two ancient Latin writers. 3. Spurious mediaeval 
writings, supposed for centuries to be authentic. 4. Peter's 
name alone being frequently used in the Fathers to repre- 
sent all our Lord's twelve apostles. 5. The Fathers fre- 
quently combining Peter's name, on this account, with that 
of Paul, who was known to have been at Rome, and to 
have been put to death there. 6. Peter's death at Babylon 
having taken place during Nero's persecution of the 
Christians in the East, and his being therefore said to 
have been " put to death by Nero." 7. Peter's death at 
Babylon having occurred about the same time as Paul's 
at Rome. 8. Peter's being spoken of as having founded 
all the churches while he was at Jerusalem, and that of 
Rome among the rest. 9. Its being supposed that the 
Fathers describe Mark's Gospel as composed at Rome, 
and under Peter's superintendence. 10. Its being sup- 
posed that the Fathers, or some of them, or, at least, one 



8 INTRODUCTION. 

of them, understood "Babylon," in 1 Peter, to mean 
Eome. 11. Its being supposed that Babylon scarcely 
existed in Peter's time, and was a great deal farther from 
Jerusalem than Antioch. 12. Peter's relics and tombs 
at Rome being more frequently mentioned in the Latin 
writers than his relics and tombs in other cities. 1 3. The 
practice in the Fathers of dating the episcopal successions 
in the different churches from the apostles. 14. Peter's 
being mentioned in the Fathers as bishop of all the Chris- 
tian cities, and therefore frequently by the Latin Fathers 
as bishop of Rome. 15. His chair being said to be in 
all the local Christian churches, and therefore, by Latin 
writers, in that at Rome. 16. Its being supposed that 
the Fathers, or some of them, thought St. John had been 
at Rome, and that, therefore, a passage in one of them 
which might be understood as stating this both of John 
and Peter, is to be so understood. 17. Its being supposed 
that the scene of the Golden Legend about the Learned 
Dogs and the Fiery Chariot being laid at Rome was 
authorized by the Fathers. 18. The manifest historical 
inconsistency of the alleged facts respecting the mission 
and martyrdom of this apostle, has contributed greatly 
to their being now regarded as traditional. For the 
establishment of this inconsistency at the period of the 
Reformation was allowed to supersede all inquiry as 
to the reality of the traditional character ascribed to 
them ; and the assertions of Cardinal Baronius, Cardinal 
Bellarmine, and the rest, upon this latter point, have been, 
therefore, ever since allowed to remain in full possession 
of the public mind. 

I am conscious that what is here written will be found to 
labour under a defect of style generally looked upon as in- 
excusable ; viz., it contains frequent repetitions. This de- 
fect it is hoped that the reader willon this occasion tolerate. 
Those who are acquainted with the peculiar mode of 



INTRODUCTION. 9 

arguing adopted by the Roman clergy, will recognise 
the necessity of it. Those who are not, will experience 
no disadvantage from it, except the addition of perhaps 
some half dozen pages to the book, which will be more 
than made amends for by the circumstance that each 
Part, and, to a great extent, each Section, being thereby 
rendered independent of the other, the book will be more 
available as one of reference. 

I have here only to add, that as one of my objects — 
hopeless and distant though it may seem to some — in 
publishing this analysis is to alleviate, in the shortest and 
surest way in which this is possible, the unhappy position 
in which the pretensions of a foreign prince have lately 
placed my Roman-catholic fellow-countrymen, and to 
arouse them for this purpose to a sense of their own eccle- 
siastical independence, so am I most anxious to disclaim 
anything like controversial animosity (if my expressions 
should on any occasion seem to indicate a feeling of this 
kind) towards such of their clergy as have written in op- 
position to the important truth that Inow seek to illustrate. 
So far am I, in fact, from any feeling of this kind, that I 
think, on the contrary, we have all reason to feel indebted 
to these gentlemen, especially to the two of last year, for 
the pains they have been at to explain, as much as they 
have done, the grounds of the extraordinary pretensions 
in question ; and let us hope that they and others will not 
be deterred by the difficulty of the undertaking, but that 
if they still retain the opinions they have expressed, they 
will see the necessity of further explanations, in propor- 
tion as the public has been unable to appreciate those 
which have been already laid before it ; or the necessity, 
at least, of revising their statements, and letting English- 
men know what it is that, on this subject, Englishmen 
are now expected to believe. 

2. Past and Present State of the Inquiry. — A Roman- 



10 INTRODUCTION. 

catholic correspondent in the Times of January 16th, 
1851, to whom we shall frequently have occasion to 
allude, seems to be under an impression that none but a 
few " weak Protestants" ever asserted that there was no 
proof — either history or tradition — of St. Peter's having 
left the East. That writer will find upon inquiry, that 
he has been totally misinformed. This assertion not only 
is not confined to "weak" Protestants, but has been 
honestly and openly made by some of the most esteemed 
and stoutest-hearted of the Roman Catholics themselves. 
Charles Du Moulin, for instance, the great ecclesiastical 
lawyer (a.d. 1566), whom Father Calmet speaks of as a 
steadfast Roman Catholic, and than whom no writer 
ever enjoyed a higher reputation for learning and intel- 
ligence, has unequivocally stated it as his opinion that 
there never was even a vague tradition among the 
ancients about Peter's having left the East, and that one 
might very well be a Roman Catholic without thinking 
that there was. In one passage he writes thus : " Even 
when after the breaking up of the empire, the bishops 
of Rome began to extend their authority over other 
churches, they never alleged or put forward this story of 
Peter's being at Rome, and of his primacy devolving in 
succession upon them, which they would not have omitted 
to do, if there had been any such thing to put forward ; 
a clear proof that there was not ; the story, I suppose, not 
having been yet invented." (Jamais n'alleguerent et 
ne mirent en avant ladite fable du siege St. Pierre a 
Rome et du Primat d'iceluy a eux successivement 
devolu, ce qu'ils n'eussent pas obmis, s'il en eust este 
aucune chose ; claire demonstrance qu'il n'en estoit rien, 
dit que ladite fable n'avoit encore este controuvee. Vol. 
iv. p. 460.) Father Leland, the celebrated English 
antiquarian (a.d. 1552), and Marsilius, a distinguished 



INTRODUCTION. 11 

Italian writer (a.d. 1324), both of whom Father Calmet 
also mentions as members of his church, were equally 
positive upon this point. Father Caron, an Irish Fran- 
ciscan of the highest eminence, (a.d. 1666), took the 
same view of the matter; as did also Father Hardouin, 
a French Jesuit (a.d. 1729), likewise in very high 
repute at Rome. u We Roman Catholics hold," says 
Father Hardouin, "that at least Peter's head was 
brought to Rome after his crucifixion, and that it ought 
to be duly worshipped there; but that the pope is 
Christ's substitute (vicarius) and Peter's successor, is 
clear enough without our being bound to suppose that 
Peter himself ever came to Rome." But it is unneces- 
sary to enumerate individual cases. Several elaborate 
works, not intended for Protestants, have been written 
for the last three or four hundred years, by Roman- 
catholics of great distinction, to assign reasons for 
thinking that St. Peter must have left the East — in 
short, during all that time scarcely a work of any kind 
came out by a Roman Catholic holding this view, that 
did not contain some little sketch of the controversy. 
Does not this of itself show to what an extent educated 
Roman Catholics must from the first have disbelieved, 
and must even still disbelieve, the story? Is it to be 
supposed for an instant that all this labour would have 
been bestowed upon an assertion which no one but a 
Protestant had expressed a doubt about, and no one 
but a Protestant was at all likely to experience any diffi- 
culty in believing? Nor is that all. It is a remarkable 
fact that not one of all those who have left the church 
of Rome (and many of them have been men of the 
greatest learning) has hesitated to assure us that they 
never could see the slightest reason for supposing that 
the great Apostle of the Circumcision had left the East. 
What stronger proofs can we require of what Roman 



- 12 INTEODUCTION. 

Catholics think upon this subject? And as to the 
"weak Protestants," who are supposed to have been 
" almost " as incredulous in this matter as educated 
Roman Catholics, the writer alluded to is quite as much 
mistaken. Mr. Bower, for instance, who wrote the 
" Lives of the Popes," is represented by him as one of 
the weak Protestants who " almost " denied this story. 
But this is not a fair statement of Mr. Bower's case. He 
did not almost deny it. This gentleman, who was a con- 
vert from the Roman persuasion, did, as I have just said 
'wJU**/ \ Saumaise, Spanheim, Bishop Bale, Luther, Calvin, Scaliger, 
and so many other men of the most energetic minds, felt 
it incumbent upon them to do after they had changed 
their opinion respecting the Christian purity of that 
church — he declared, in the most emphatic manner, that 
there was not, and that he had never been able to dis- 
cover (even while he was a Roman Catholic), the slightest 
pretext for such a supposition. " In this controversy," 
says Bower, in one place, " the silence of St. Paul in 
particular, if duly attended to, must be thought by every 
unbiassed man a far more convincing proof of St. Peter's 
not having been at Rome, than all the authorities that 
have been yet alleged are of his having been there." I 
give Mr. Bower's own words to show how little reliance 
can be placed upon the statements in the letter published 
in the Times, that I have alluded to, most of which the 
correspondent seems to have transcribed second-hand 
from other writers, though not always, as here, acknow- 
ledging that he does so. Father M c Corry, of Scotland, 
in the other statement published last year upon this sub- 
ject, seems also to have taken everything at second-hand 
from others, for there is scarcely any one of his state- 
ments that is not contrary to fact. One or two instances 
may be given here; others will be found in the course of 
these pages. He says (p. 21 of the tract called u Was St. 



INTRODUCTION. 13 

Peter ever at Rome?") that Scaliger expresses his "amaze- 
ment that this great leading fact of church history should 
be matter of litigation." Whereas Scaliger's amazement 
seems to have been all the other way. " That this false 
interpretation cannot stand," says he, speaking of the 
Eoman clergy, thinking Babylon meant Eome in 1 Peter, 
" I have clearly shown in the third book of the Canons, 
at the twelfth epoch ; and assuredly they have no other 
argument in support of Peter's alleged journey except 
that which they think they have in this Epistle." (The- 
saurus Temporum, p. 424.) And again, this very 
learned and stout-hearted man declares — " As to Peter's 
having gone to Rome, and having been put to death 
there, there is no person with the least education that 
could believe such a story." (Nam de ejus Romam ad- 
ventu et supremo capitis supplicio ibidem, nemo qui 
paulo humanior fuerit, credere posset — Scaliger's Notes 
on the New Testament.) Father M c Corry also (p. 22) 
describes Calvin as saying that he could not " withstand" 
the evidence of Peter's having died in Italy ; whereas what 
Calvin says is (after mentioning that some writers agreed 
in supposing it), "I am not now raising the question 
as to whether he may have died there, since these writers 
suppose he did (propter hunc scriptorum consensum, non 
pugno quin illic mortuus fuerit) ; but I positively deny 
that he was bishop there." — Instit. iv. 6. And again, 
still more distinctly in his commentary on 2 Peter i, 14 : 
" But how with this intimation of his approaching end 
at Babylon, could Peter have been put to death at Rome ? 
Unless we suppose that he could fly, it is manifestly 
certain that he did not die in Italy." (Certe nisi 
maria et terras momento transvolaverit, procul ab 
Italia mortuum esse constat.) Adam Clarke was 
another of these " weak " Protestants. With all his 
learning and all his research, he could see no pretext for 



14 INTRODUCTION. 

supposing that the apostle had ever left the East. " I 
am of opinion," says this profound scholar, "that St. 
Peter did not write from Rome — that he was neither 
bishop of Rome nor martyred at Rome — in a word, that 
he never was at Rome." Dr. Kitto is another. " There 
is no sufficient reason," (says he, in his Encyclopaedia of 
Biblical Literature), " for believing that Peter was ever 
even so much as within the walls of Rome." Father 
Eeuardent (a.d. 1610) seems to think that there were a 
great many Protestants in this predicament in his day, 
but attributes it rather to hardihood than to weakness. 
" I cannot but wonder," exclaims the indignant priest, 
u at the abandoned impudence (profligatam impuden- 
tiam) with which Valesius. Illyricus, Functius, Gallatius, 
and others who have left our church, dare to prate (aude- 
ant blatterare) about Peter's never having been at Rome." 
" Several Protestants," says Father Tillemont (a.d. 
1698), " have lately maintained that Peter could never 
have been in Italy." " The majority of Protestants," 
says the Bibliographie Universelle, a work under the 
sanction of the Roman clergy, and largely contributed to 
by many of them — u The majority of Protestants (la 
plupart des Protestans) reject this supposition." (Art. 
Bauldri. ) 

The first systematic attempt of any note which seems 
to have been made to remove the doubts and convictions 
entertained upon this point by the educated classes of 
the Roman communion was that of Cardinal Baronius 
(a.d. 1607), who, seeing the arguments vanishing in the 
hands of his predecessors, thought to secure something 
by making a grasp at everything. So, to the utter 
astonishment of all the world, he took his stand upon 
two mistranslations of Greek text, by a Latin writer in 
the 5th century, and sought to make it appear not only 
that the apostle had not been put to death at Babylon 



INTRODUCTION. 1 5 

(where Peter himself tells us that his martyrdom was 
impending), but that Europe was the head-quarters 
of the mission entrusted to him by our Lord, and that 
he occupied it as such five-and-twenty-years, i.e. more 
than twice as long as he did Jerusalem. Almost imme- 
diately the Roman clergy of all grades refused to coun- 
tenance such a proposition. Cardinal Bellarmine (a.d. 
1621), from whom we have the next collection of what 
were supposed to be testimonies respecting Peter's 
having left the East, says nothing about the alleged 
residence of five-and-twenty years in Europe, and wisely 
premises that, even if it could not be proved by history 
or tradition, that the apostle ever left the East, it was 
nevertheless very clear that he had been Bishop of Pome 
as well as of all the other churches of Christendom, and 
that this ought to be sufficient for the Roman Catholic 
supremacy anywhere. Two briefer collections of these 
supposed testimonies appeared soon afterwards ; — one by 
Father Feuardent, the celebrated Franciscan orator al- 
ready alluded to, — the other by Henry de Yalois (Va- 
lesius a.d. 1676), the still more celebrated Roman- 
catholic editor of Eusebius, — in which collections these 
two eminent men, eminent alike for their zeal and for 
their learning, confine themselves, unlike the two car- 
dinals, to Antenicene writers only, as the sole true 
ground of tradition in such matters. These writers also, 
it is almost needless to say, abandoned, as untenable, the 
grand point of Baronius, that Europe had been Peter's 
head-quarters for five-and-twenty years, and contented 
themselves with merely making out as good a case as 
possible for the supposition that he died here. The next 
collection of supposed testimonies to which we are re- 
ferred is that by Bishop Pearson (a.d. 1 686), in which the 
bishop utterly denies that there was ever the least pretext 
for the hypothesis about the five-and-twenty years, and 



1 6 INTRODUCTION". 

only tried to show that the apostle might not have died 
in the East, for which purpose, however, he considers 
that the Antenicene evidence of Feuardent and Yalesius 
was insufficient. About this period of the controversy 
a singular occurrence took place. A Eoman-catholic 
antiquarian, on the continent, found in Colbert's library 
a little MS. which was firmly believed by him and every- 
body else to be of very high historical character, and in 
which it was plainly stated that the apostle really had 
come into Europe. So much satisfaction did this state- 
ment occasion, that the Eoman-catholic clergy hesitated 
not to join the antiquarian in acknowledging that this, 
after all, was the only direct and substantial testimony 
there was upon the subject. Within about thirty years 
afterwards, however, it was discovered by themselves 
that there had been a mistake made about the MS., and 
that it was not authentic ! The names, dates, and other 
circumstances connected with this event, are given here 
in the section on Lactantius, whose work it was sup- 
posed to have been. Since the confusion of opinions 
consequent upon this discovery no writers of any note 
have meddled with the question. Mr. Baratier, indeed, 
(a.d. 1740), a talented young German, who was 
about nineteen years old when he died, and was not 
aware that the Lactantian MS. was unauthentic, wrote 
in a tone of great confidence upon the subject, and is 
considered by the Roman clergy, apparently on this sole 
account, as a very valuable auxiliary. He denounces, 
of course, the old supposition about the five-and -twenty 
years, adding, that the learned of all parties had long 
since proved it to be absurd, and does little else in reality 
than refer to, and repeat the collection of supposed 
testimonies that was made by the Bishop of Chester. 
We now come to the two most recent collections that 
have appeared. One is that of the Correspondent in the 



INTRODUCTION. 17 

Times, already alluded to, contained in a letter addressed 
to the Editor, and signed " Truth." The other is that 
of Father M c Corry of Scotland, in his tract, entitled 
"Was St. Peter ever at Rome?" in which he admits 
that the affirmative of this question has been very ex- 
tensively denied, and that it requires proof, and professes 
to give the strongest points that he could find in the 
writings of four other parties, viz., Noel Alexander (a 
Doctor of the Sorbonne), Father Foggini, Father Dol- 
linger, and Father Palma, which dispenses with any 
separate reference to these writers here. Incredible as 
it may appear, both the recent writers now indicated seek 
to revive in England the old theory of Baronius, about 
the Five- and- Twenty years, that had been rejected at 
Rome from its first promulgation, literally centuries ago ! 
as well as Jacques de Voragine's Golden Legend, about 
the Learned Dogs and the Fiery Chariot at Rome ! In 
addition to which remarkable points, Father M c Corry is 
led by his authorities to repeat, without examination, all 
the old mis-statements about the city of Babylon, men- 
tioned in Peter's First Epistle ; while the Correspondent 
in the Times professes not to be aware that the Lactan- 
tian MS. was discovered, and that too by his own church, 
to be a forgery. In other respects they merely repeat 
the usual references, which, as it will be seen, are pre- 
cisely similar to those by which some of the Roman 
clergy have tried to prove that Peter was at Canter- 
bury. In order that the reader may be able to see the 
utmost that was ever attempted to be adduced from 
antiquity, he will find appended to this work the eight 
foregoing statements, viz., that of Baronius, Bellarmine, 
Feuardent, Valesius, Bishop Pearson, and Baratier, to- 
gether with the Roman-catholic Letter that appeared in 
the Times, and the twelve supposed testimonies translated 
in Father M c Corry's Tract. 

c 



18 INTRODUCTION. 

As to the other side of the question, the fallacy of 
supposing that Peter ever left the East has from the 
first been felt rather than proved. Father Foggini, in- 
deed, mentions that our proposition has been always 
more or less asserted in books ever since the 14th 
century, i. e. since the Koman clergy, in order to protect 
themselves against the Reformers, began first to assert 
the contrary. Father Mamachi (a.d. 1792) makes a 
similar statement, enumerating upwards of a dozen 
writers on this other side of the question. Owing, how- 
ever, to one grand defect common to them all, the 
exertions of these writers have not been attended with 
that success which we might have expected from the 
labours of such men. Instead of examining the passages 
adduced by the opposite party, these controversialists 
many of them men of learning and ability unsurpassed 
(among whom we may reckon Calvin, Saumaise, Span- 
heim, and Scaliger), contented themselves with merely 
denying the accuracy of those Fathers who either 
wrote or were supposed to have written these passages, 
and with indicating the glaring historical inconsistency 
of the statement supposed to be contained in them; 
thus rather confirming the evil than removing it; for 
these men of world-wide fame thereby seemed to give 
their high sanction to the mistaken interpretation of 
some of these passages, and to the mistaken authenticity 
of others. What they have omitted to do is what is now 
done. 



A LIST 

OF 

All the Writers and of all the Greek and Latin Passages 
that have ever been alleged as testimony of St Peter's 
having left the East. 

CHRONOLOGICALLY ARRANGED. 



Jpttst Gfanturg. 

The Book called the K^vy^a Ilcrioov. a.d. 45. 
Linus, a.d. 70. 
Anacletus. a.d. 91. 
Clemens Romanus. a.d. 100. 

AW lvol T(ov apxciKdv vTTodeiyiJLaTiov 7rav<JU)fieda, e\du)fxev ettl tovq 
eyyiara y£vofX£vovg AdXrjTag, Xa&iofj.£v rrjg yEvsag rj/uLO)v ra yevvaia 
v7ro^eiyfj.ara dia ^r)Xov Kai <pdovov £KKXr](TLag,Xat>(s)fX£v Tzpo otyOaXfjuov fjfiiov 
tovq ayadovg anooToXovg. 'O Herpog 3ta £rjXov cl&lkov ovk kva ovde dvo 
aXXa TrXewvag vTn]VEyKEV irovovg /cat ovro) fxaprvp-qarag eiropevdrj elq tov 
o^eiXofxevop towov ttjq dofyg. Ata ^rfXov /cat 6 n<xv\oe V7ro/j.orr]g €pa(3£tov 

VTZEVyEV, E7TTO.ICIQ tWjUa ^OjO^CClC, <pvya$£vQ£ig, Xl0aO"0£tC, KTjpvJ; yEVOfJLEVOg 

ev te rr\ avaToXr) /cat ev tyj Svctel to yEvvaiov ty]q ttlgtewq avTov kXeoq 
eXo&ev, (liicaioffvvrjv dtda^ag 6Xov tov icoafiov, Kai ettl to TEpfia ttjq Svgewq 
sXdwv, /j.apTvpr}ffag etti to>v fjyovfXEViov, ovrojg <nrr)XXayr] tov kov/iov /cat 
elq tov ayiov to-kov £7rop£vdrf v7rofiovr]g ysvofiEVog fiEyiarog v7roypajj,jxog. — 
Epist. ad Corinth, c. 5. 

gbeconfc Ctnturg. 
Ignatius, a.d. 107. 

Ov)( wg YLETpog /cat HavXog diaTaarffofxai vfiiv. TZkeivoi cltto(jtoXoi, eyw 

KCLTClKpiTOg' EKELVOL e\fV0£pOl, Eyiti Ie fXEJ^pi VVV SovXog' a\X' EaV TTCldh), 

cLTTEXevQEpog Itjctovj /cat amoT*7<7o/.tai ev avry EXsvdEpog. — Epist. ad 
Rom. c. 4. 

Papias. a.d. 110. 

Kai Tovd' 6 Trp£(rt>VTEpog eXeye. Map/coe [Xev EpfjrjvEvrrjg Ilerpov yEvo- 
fXEvog, baa Efivrj/jLovEvaEV a/cpi€wg £ypa\p£V, ov jxevtol tcl£,ei ra vko tov 

c2 



20 A LIST OF ALL THE WRITERS, ETC. 

Xpiarov i] XEy^EVTa t] Trpaydevra, Ovre yap r]Kov(TE tov Kvpiov ovte 
7rapeKo\ov6r](T£P avro)' varepov de, wg Ety-qv, Hetoo) 6g irpog rag xpsiag 
ettoieito rag SidacrKaXtag, oAX' ov\ uxnrep avvTa^iv tcjv KvpiaKOJv 7roiovfX£vog 
Xoywv' wore ovhev rjfiapre WapKog ovrojg evia ypaxpag wg air£/jivr]fWV£V(7£v, 
'Evog yap tT:oir\aaro irpovoiav, tov [xrjdev wv rjKovae 7rapa\nreiv r\ \p£vaaadai 
tl ev avTOig. Tavra jjlev ovv l<rropr)rai toj Uamy, 7repi tov Mapicov. — Apud. 
Euseb. 3. 39. 

Heracleon. a.d. 126. 

The Recognitions. 

The Clementina. 

The Apostolic Constitutions. 

The heading of the chapter is : Tivag 7r£jntovT£g £y£ipoTovv\aav ol 
ayioi Atto(ttoXoi. The chapter then proceeds thus : Ilepi Se tuv vtp' 
rjfiojv yeipoTOvriQevTitiv ettigkotcwv ev tyj t,uri Tt] rjfiETEpa, yviopi^ofXEv v/iiv 
oti ektiv oiiToC .... Avrio^Eiag $£ Evotkoe fXEP V7r' eixov U-Erpov, lyvaTiog 

t)£ v7ro TLavXov Tr/e %£ Pw/xatwv EKKXrjcriag Aivog jxev 6 KXavSiag 

7rph)Tog, vtto liavXov, KXrj/irjg <$£ fiETa tov Aivov SavaTOV, brf Efxov IlETpov, 

()£vr£pog, KEyEipoTOvrjTai ovtoi ol v(f rj/jLCJV EfimaTEv^EVTEg Tag ev 

Kvptw TrapoiKiag. — lib. C. 46. 

DlONYSIUS CORINTHUS. A.D. 170. 
Tavra Kai vfi£ig Sia Trjg ToaavTr\g vov^Eaiag ttjv airo TlETpov Kai UavXov 
tyvTEiav yEvrjQEicrav Pojfiaiwv te Kai KopivOiw avv£K£pao£T£, Kai yap 
ajM^ia Kai £ig tt\v rj/xETEpav Kopivdov <pvT£vaavT£g r]fxag, SfAoiug %e Kai Etg 
Tt\v ItoXiuv, OfiocrE dida£avT£g, EfiapTvprjaav Kara tov avTOV Kaipov. — 
Extract preserved in Euseb. 2, 25, from a letter addressed to the Romans. 

Hegesippus. a.d. 180. 
Victor, a.d. 200. 
Iren^eus. a.d. 200. 

f O fi£v <Hr) MaT$uiog ev Toig 'ECpatotc tyj iBia SuiXektid avriov Kai ypa<prjv 
£^,r)V£yK£v EvayyEXiov, tov IlETpov Kai TLavXov ev Pojfjtrj EvayyEXi^ofXEviov 
Kai ^£jjieXiovvt(ov ttjv EKKXrjaiav. Mera $£ ttjv tovt(ov e^oSov, Map/cog 
6 luLaSrjTrjg Kai EpjjbrjVEVTrjg UsTpov Kai avTog ra biro IlETpov Ky\pva<jo\i£va 
Eyypa(j)ix)g fjfiiv 7rapa()E(i><x)K£V. — lib. 3, c. 1. 

Quoniam valde longum est in hoc tali volumine, omnium ecclesiarum 
enumerare successionem, maximse et antiquissimse et omnibus cognitse, 
a gloriosissimis duobus Apostolis Paulo et Petro (50 in the Jesuit MS. 
called Claromontane, and said by the Roman-catholics to be " optimal 
notce codex; so also in the Vossian MS., called by the Roman-catholics, 
" optimus " et " verissimus,'"') Romse fundatse et constitutse ecclesise, 
indicantes, &c. — Gimp. 3. {Greek lost.) 



A LIST OF ALL THE WRITERS, ETC. 21 

QeueXtiOffavrec ovv Kai otKO^OfirjaavTEg ol fiaKaptoi AttogtoXoi rrjv 
£Kic\r)aiav, Aivw rr\v ttjq E7ri(TK07rr]Q Xetrovpytav eveyeipiaav. Tovrov tov 
Aivov HavXog ev rate irpog TifioOeov £7U(TToXaig /j.Efxvr]Tai. Aiahe^erai 
%£ avrov AveyicXriTog. Mera tovtov oe rpiru) T07ru) aito t<ov AttootoXojv 
rr)v €7riffK07rrjv tcXrjpovTai KXrj/jirjg. — ibidem. 

Lucianus Charinus. a.d. 200. v 

TOrtr GFentutg. 
Clemens Alexandrinus. a.d. 217. 

Avdig <?ev roig avroig 6 KXrifjirjg j3i€Xioig Trept rrjg ra^eojg rwv evayyeXnov 
irapaloatv to)v aveicadev Trpeajjvrepwv teQeltcli tovtov E-yovaav rov rpowov. 
HpoyeypcKpOai eXeyero twv evayyeXiu)v to: TrepuyovTa Tag yeveaXoyiag' 
to de Kara ^lapKov ravTrjv Ea^KEvai tt\v oucovofiiav. Tov IlETpov 
drj/ioaia ev ^(o/jltj Kf)pvE,avTog tov Xoyov, /cat UvEVfian ro evayyEXwv 
E^ELirovTog, Tovg wapovrag 7roXXovg ovTag TtapaicaXEGai tov Map/cov wg av 
aKoXovdqaavTa avTO) 7ropp(i)d£V Kai fiEfivrjUEVov tojv Xe'xOsvtojv avaypaxpai 
to. Eipr\\iEva' 7rotY)(7avTa (j£ to EvayyEXiov, fiETacovvai roig ^EOfiEvoig 
avrov' 'OrcEp ErnyvovTa tov IlETpov TrpoTpE7TTuc(og firjTE KioXvaai firfTE 
7rpoTp£\pcu. — Apud. Euseb. 6, 14. 

Caius. a.d. 218. 

Kai EKKXrjcriaaTiKog avrjp, Tcilog ovo/hq, Kara Zscpvpivov Pwfiaiiov ysyoviog 
EiriOKoirov' 6g Brj ILpoKXu) Trjg Kara Qpvyag 7rpoiaTaji£vo) yvojjirjg Eyypoupug 
ItaXEyQEig, avTa drj ravra ir£pi tiov tottiov evScl tcjv EiprjjjiEveJV AtcootoXiov 
to, lEpavKrjvojpara KarareS'eirat, §r\oiv' Eyw }>£ Ta Tpoiraia tiov anrofTToXwv 
Eyia £«£ai. Eav yap dEXrjffyg airEXdEiv ettl tov ISaKTiKavov, rj ettl ttjv 
odov rt\v QiffTiav, £vpr)<r£ig Tarpo7raiaTb)v TavTtjv IdpvaafXEviov rt]v EKKXrjmav. 
Apud. Euseb. 2, 25. 

HlPPOLYTUS. A.D. 250. 

An anonymous author, a.d. 250. 

$a<ri yap Tovg fi£V TrporEpovg anavTag Kai avrovg rovg om-offToXovg 
irapEiXrityEvai te koi dEdida^Evai ravra a vvv ovtol Xsyovffi Kai TETrjprjtrdai 
Tf\v aXrjdEiav tov KrjpvyfxaTog f*£XP L TU)J/ BacTopog ^povojv, 6g r\v TpiOKai%£- 
Karog otto IlETpov, ev Pw^p ETnatcoTrog' airo Be tov Biado^ov ovtov Z£(pvpivov 
TrapaKEyapa-^Qai rrjv aXrjdEiav. — Apud. Euseb. 5, 28. 

Sextus Julius Africanus. a.d. 250. 
Tertullian. a.d. 250. 

Quam felix Ecclesia ("ista quam" is in no MS.), cui totam doctrinam 
apostoli cum sanguine suo profuderunt ! Ubi Petrcis passioni 



22 A LIST OF ALL THE WRITERS, ETC. 

Dominicae adaequatur; ubi Paulus Joannis exitu coronatur; ubi Apos- 
tolus Joannes (posteaquam in oleum igneum demersus nihil passus 
est) in insulam relegatur. — Be Prcescript. c. 36. 

Nee quidquam refert inter eos quos Joannes in Jordane, et Petrus 
in Tiberi tinxit. — De Baptis. c. 4. 

Vitas Csesarum leghnus. Orientem fidem Romae primus Nero 
cruentavit. Tunc Petrus ab altero cingitur cum cruci astringitur. 
Tunc Paulus civitatis Romanes consequitur nativitatem, cum illic 
martyrii renascitur generositate. — Seorpiacum, c. 15. 

Romani — quibus evangelium et Petrus et Paulus sanguine quoque 
suo signatum reliquerunt. — Adversus Marcionem, c. 6. 

Cyprian, a.d. 250. 

Factus est autem Cornelius Episcopus cum Fabiani locus, id est, 
cum locus Petri et gradus Cathedrae sacerdotalis vacaret. — Epist. 55, 
c. 6. 

Roma — Cathedra Petri. — Passim. 

FlRMILIAN. A.D. 250. 

At que ego in hac parte juste indignor ad hanc tarn apertam et 
manifestam Stephani stultitiam quod qui sic de episcopatus sui loco 
gloriatur et se successionem Petri tenere contendit, super quern funda- 
menta ecclesiae collocata sunt, multas alias petras inducat et eccle- 

siarum multarum nova sedificia constituat Stephanus qui per 

successionem Cathedram Petri habere se prsedicat, nullo adversus hsere- 
ticos zelo excitatur. — Apud Cyprian. Epist. 

Stephen, a.d. 250. 
Origen. a.d. 254. 

jfourti) GDenturg. 

Petrus Alexandrinus. a.d. 311. 
Arnobius. a.d. 330. 

Viderant enim cursum Simonis Magi et quadrigas igneas Petri ore 
difflatas et nominato Christo evanuisse. Yideran,t inquam fidentem 
diis falsis et ab iisdem metuentibus proditum, pondere prsecipitatum 
suo, cruribus jacuisse praafractis. Post deinde perlatum Brundam cru- 
ciatibus et pudore defessum, ex altissimi culminis se rursum prsecipi- 
tasse fastigio. Quae omnia vos gesta neque scitis, neque scire voluistis, 
neque unquam vobis necessaria judicastis; ac dum vestris fiditis cordibus 
etc. — Lib. 2. 

Lactantius. a.d. 330. 

Discipuli (Christi) vero per provincias dispersi, fundamenta Ecclesise 



A LIST OF ALL THE WRITERS, ETC 23 

ubique posuerunt, facientes et ipsi in nomine Magistri Dei magna et 
pene incredibilia miracula; quia discedens instruxerat eos virtute ac 
potestate qua posset novae annuntiationis ratio fundari et confirmari: sed 
et futura aperuit illis omnia quae Petrus et Paulus Pomae praedicaverunt, 
et ea Praeclicatio, in memoriam scripta, permansit; in qua cum multa 
alia mira, turn etiam hoc fiiturum esse dixerunt, ut post breve tempus 
immitteret Deus regem qui expugnaret Judaeos et civitatem eorum solo 
adaequaret etc. . . . Itaque post illorum obitum cum eos Nero intere- 
misset, Judaeorum nomen et gentem Yespasianus extinxit fecitque 
omnia quae illi futura praedixerant. — Institut. lib. 4 ; c. 21. 

Eusebius. A.D. 340. 

(Title of Chapter — Ilept tov Kara^ojfirjv Krjpvy/jLarog Herpov tov Krcoa- 
toXov) .... E7rt€af c)e ('0 jiayog) ttjq Vu)fiaib)v 7ro\ea>e, avvaipo}Ji£vr}g aura) ra 
fieyaXarrjg ecpecpevovarjQ Evravda ^vvajiEiog, ev oXiyyToaovrov rarjje ettl-^el- 
prjcrEwg rjvvcrro ugicai avSpiavTog avadeaei irpog avrwv tjj^e ola$EOV Tifj,r)$r)vai. 
Ov \ir\v Eig naicpov avru) ravra Trpovyupei. ULapairo^ag yovv ettl ttjq avrrjg 
KAavctov fiaanXEiag, rj iravayadog Kai (piXavdpij)7roTaTr] tmv 'OXiov 7rpovota 

TOV KapTEpOV KCLl jLteyaV T(OV AtTOGToXuV TOV apETT}g EVEKCLTOJV XoiTTlOV CLTZaVTlOV 

irpo-qyopov, Herpov etti tt]v Pw/jtjv <*>g ettl ttjXlkovtov XvfiEwva (3iov %Eip- 
aywyei, bg ola Tig yEVvawg Geov arpaT^yog TOig dsioig 07rXoig (ppa^cifXEvog, 

T7)V TToXvTlflTjTOV EfJLTTOpiClV TOV VOTjTOV <j)(0T0g E% aVCLToXlOV TOig KClTd dwiV 

EicofiL^EVj^ipiog avTO Kai Xoyov \pv%u)v crojTrjpiov, to K^pvy/za Tr\g tiov 
ovpavwv fiaviXEiag EvayyEXi^OfiEvog ovtio c 3 ovv ETriSrjjj.rjo'avTog avToig 
tov 0ELOV Xoyov, f] fiEV tov liifxiovog (tov fiayov) a7T£Gr(3rj Kai 7rapaxpj?/*a 
aw Kai ra) av£pi KaraXeXvro dwapig. — 2.14. 

(Title of chapter — Hepi tov fcaraMapjcov evayyeXiov.) Toaovd' EnEXafixpEv 
raig Th)V aKpoaTiov tov Herpov Siavoiaig evce€eta£ (f)£yyog <bg fxrj ttj eica7ra£ 
iKavwg e^eiv apKEiadai aKor], firj^E Trj aypacjxp tov Beiov KrjpvyfiaTog B^aa- 
KaXia, 7rapaicXr]crEcri ds 7ravT0iaig Map/cov, bv to EvayyEXiov (pEpETai aicoX- 
ovdov ovtcl Herpov Xnrapqaai, ojg av Kat Sia ypatyrjg v7ro/j.vr]iJ,a T-qg dia Xoyov 
7rapaSodEi(rr)g avTOig KaTaXEt\l/oidi^a(TKaXiag,fX7]7rpoTEpov re av£ivai,y\ karep- 
yaaaaQai tov avZpa, Kat ravrr; aiTiovg yevecr^at Trjg tov Xeyo^ievov fcara 
MapKOV EvayyeXiov ypatyr)g. Yvovra c"e to irpayQEV (j)aai tov a7roaToXov, 
awoKaXv^avTog avrw tov izvEv^arog, rjadrjvai tyj tiov avdptov Trpodvjxta, 
Kvpoxrai re ttjv ypatyrjv Eig evtev^lv rate EKKXrjfTiaig' (KXrjfirjg ev ekto) tu)v 
viroTv-rruxTEWv xapaTE&ELTai ttjv 'laroptav, avvETtipiapTvpEL ftavTU) Kat 6 
Iepa7ro\tr//c EirMTKOTrog ovofxari Ha7rtae-) tov Se Mop/cov fxvrjfxovEVEtv rov 
Herpov ev tyj TrpoTEpa. E7r kttoXt), rjv fcai avvTa^ai (f>a(nv Eir'avT-qg Vu)fxr)g f 
GYjfxaivEiv re tovt avrov, ttjv 7toXlv TpomKWTtpov Ba€v\o)^a TzpoaEVKOvra 
c\a tovt(jjv, Aairai^ETai vfxag y ev Ba€v\wvt avvEKXEKTrj, Kai Mapvoe b vlog 
fiov. — 2.15. 

'Ov (<biXiova) Kat Xoyog e^ei Kara KXavhov exl rrjg Viofiyg Eig bjxiXiav 



24 A LIST OP ALL THE WRITERS, ETC. 

eXBelv Jlerpo), roig ekelge tote KrjpvTTOVTi. Kcu ovk airsiKog av evt] tovto 
je, £7tei /cat 6 <pa/j,£v avTG) avyypafifxa aatyioc, tovq eiq etl vvv /cat elq rjfxag 

TVE(f)v\ayfXEVOVQ TYjQ £KK\r)<TlClQ TTEptE^EL KCLVOVCLC. EuSeb. 2.17. 

JlETpog Be ev Hovtw /cat TaXaTia, /cat HiOvviq, Ka7r7racWtg ? te /cat Aata, 

KEKTjpv^EPai TOLQ EV dlCMT7TOpa lovdctlOLQ EOLKEV, OQ /Cat E7TI TeXeL EV PwjUTf 

yEvofXEvog avEa-KoXoTruxdr} /cara K£(paXtjg, ovTU)g avTog a^iwaag 7rad£iv. — 
Euseb. 3.1. 

Aivog Se ov jjLEjivrjTai (YlavXog) avvovTog etvl Vcofxrjg ai/rw /cara ttjv 
CEVTEpav irpog Ti/hoOeov £7ri(TToXr]v, TrpioTog /jeto. JlsTpov Trjg Pw/Jiaiwv 
£KKXrj(Tiag tyjv ETricrKOTrrjv rjdr) irpoTEpov KXijpoodEtg c^c^Xwrat. AXXa /cat 
6 KXrjfirjg Trjg Poj fiauov /cat avTog EtacXrjffiag rpiTog EfruTKOTrog mraorag 
UavXov (TWEpyog /cat avvadXrjTrjg ysyovEvai irpog avTOV fxapTvpEiTai. — 
Euseb. 3.4. 

Julian the Apostate, a.d. 361. 

Akovwv cie oifxai Kat to. fivrjfiaTa HsTpov /cat UavXov, Xadpa jxev, 
cucovcov Be bjxiog avTa TTEpt^Epo/jLEva ("cireumferri," in Father Hervetfs Paris 
edition, 1604, — alii, " QEpaTTEvojiEva"} irpuTog EToXfirjcrEV evkeiv. — Apud. 
Cyril. Alexan. adv. Jul. lib. 10. 

Eutropius. Before a.d. 400. 

Denique omnibus nagitiis suis etiam hoc addidit (Nero) quod Sanctos 
Dei Apostolos Petrum Paulumque trucidavit. — Lib. 7. 

Athanasius. a.d. 373. 

UsTpog ()£ 6 cW tov <po£ov tu)v lovdauov KpvTTTOfJLEVog, kcu HctvXog 6 
airotTToXog ev (rapyavrj ^aXaa^Eig /cat <pvyo)v, cacovcravTEg, £ig Piofxrjv £et 
vfxag fjLapTvprjvai, ovk avE&aXovTO tyjv aTrohrjfXiav. XaipovTEg Se /.taXXov 
cnrrjXQov, kcu 6 jjlev (hg irpog Tovg idiovg (nrEvdojv Eyavvvro ff(pa^o/j,£vog, 

6 $£ KCU TTCtpOVTCl TOV KCtipOV OV KaTETTTYjGEV a\Xa KCU EKaV^CLTO XsyWV, 

Eyw yap rjdrj (nrEvdoficu, /cat 6 Kcupog Trjg avaXvffEwg jjlov £(})£<TTr)K£. — 
Apolog. de Fugd sud. c. 18. 

Philastrius. a.d. 380. 

Qui (Magus) cum fugeret beatum Petrum de Hierosolymitana 
civitate, Romamque veniret, cum beato Apostolo apud Neronem regem, 
devictus undique oratione beati Apostoli atque percussus ab angelo, 
sic meruit interire ut ejus magise evidens mendacium cunctis homini- 
bus patefieret. — c. 29. 

Cyril of Jerusalem, a.d. 386. 

UapaTEivo/JLEvrjg ds Trjg rcXavrjg, ayadwv %vvu)pig diopOovTcu to TZTcu(T\xa 
TlETpog /cat IlavXoe 7rapayEvojiEVOL, 61 Trjg EKKXrjaiag TrpoaTCtTcu' /cat £7ri- 
Beiktuovto. tov vofii£ofi£vov Oeov %i[x(ova VEKpov Evdvg cnrEdEiZav. E7ray- 
ytXXofJLEvov yap tov JZifxiovog fXETEtopt^Ecrdai £ig rovg ovpavovg Kai £7r' 



A LIST OF ALL THE WRITERS, ETC. 25 

oyYIfMiTOQ daijjLOVojp EKaepoQ tyepo/uLEVOv, yovv kXivclvteq ol tov Qeov covXol 
fccu rr\v crv/j.(j)(i)riay EyEEi^afiEvot, y\v evkev O \rjaovg, k. t. X. (Matt, xviii. 
19, 20,) to rrjg bfiovoictQ €e\oq <Hia rrjg Trpoa£vyr\g iTEfixpavTEQ Kara TOV 

Mayov KarE^aXou avrov eiq rr}v yr]v Ovrog Trpojrog 6 rrjg Kcuctag 

dpaictojv. — Oatech. 6. 

Ambrose, a.d. 397. 
Optatus. Before a.d. 400. 

Negare non potes scire te in urbe Roma Petro primo Cathedram 
Episcopalem esse collatani, in qua sederit omnium Apostolorum Caput 
Petrus.— 2.2. 

Ergo Cathedram unicam sedit prior Petrus. Cui successit Linus. 
—2.3. 

Jtftj) teturg. 

Old Roman Calendar. After 400. 
Epiphanius. a.d. 403. 

E v Pwjuj7 yap (J^ttkjkottol) yEyovaat 7rpu)TOt TlErpog icai YLavXog,ol airo(r- 
toXoi avroi /cat £7n<rico7rot, eitcl Aivog, k. r. X. — lib. i. Hceres. 27. 

'H T(ov ev Pwjuy £7U(TK07r(i)v Eiadoxn Tavrrjv e^el rr\v aKoXovdtav, TlErpog 
Kai UavXog, Aivog, k. t. X. — Ibid. 

Prudentius. a.d. 406. 

Unus utrumque dies, pleno tamen renovatus anno, 
Vidit superba morte laureatum. 

Scit Tiberina palus, numine quae lambitur propinquo, 
Binis dicatum cespitem tropseis. 
Et crucis et gladii testis, quibus irrigans easdem 
Bis fluxit imber sanguinis per herbas. 

*''•**'■"'** 

Dividit ossa duum Tibris. 

Peristeph. Hymn. 12. 
Discede Jupiter, 

Relinque Romam liberam plebemque jam Cbristi fage. 
Te Paulus hinc exterminat, te sanguis exturbat Petri, 
Tibi id, quod ipse armaveras, factum Neronis officit. 

Hymn, de S. Laurentio. 

Chrysostom. a.d. 407. 
Jerome, a.d. 420. 

Hujus (Claudii) anno secundo Petrus Apostolus quum primum 
Antiochenam ecclesiam fundasset, Romam mittitur, ubi evangelium 



26 A LIST OF ALL THE WRITERS, ETC. 

prsedicans XXY annos ejusdem urbis episcopus perseverat. — The Latin 
Chronicon, translated from Eusebius. 

Petrus, post episcopatum Antiochensis ecclesise et prsedicationem 
dispersionis eorum qui de circumcisione crediderunt in Ponto, Galatia, 
Cappadocia, Asia, Bithynia, secundo Claudii anno ad expugnandmn 
Simonem Magum Roniam pergit, ibique viginti quinque annos cathe- 
dram Sacerdotalem tenuit usque ad ultimum annum Neronis, id est, 
decimum quartum, a quo suffixus cruci martyrio coronatus est. — De 
Scriptoribus Ecclesiasticis, also translated from Eusebius. 

Marcus discipulus et interpres Petri, juxta quod Petrum referentem 
audierat, rogatus Pomse a fratribus, breve scripsit Evangelium; quod 
quum Petrus audisset, probavit. Meminit hujus Marci et Petrus in 
Epistola prima sub nomine Babylonis figuraliter Pomam significans. — 
(1 Peter, v. 13.)— Ibid. 

SULPITIUS, A.D. 430. 

Namque eo tempore (in Nero's reign) divina apud urbem religio 
invaluerat, Petro ibi episcopatum gerente, et Paulo posteaquam ab 
injusto prsesulis judicio Csesarem appellaverat, Pomani deducto. Ad 
quern turn audiendum plures conveniebant ; qui veritate intellecta, 
virtutibus que Apostolorum quas turn crebro ediderant, permoti,ad cul- 
tum Dei sese conferebant. Etenim turn illustris ilia adversus Simonem 
Petri ac Pauli congressio fait. Qui cum magicis artibus, ut se deum 
probaret, duobus suffultus demoniis evolasset, orationibus Apostolorum 
fugatis demonibus, delapsus in terrain populo inspectante, disruptus 
est— Lib. 2, c. 40. 

Latis legibus religio vetabatur, palamque edictis propositis, Christi- 
anum esse non licebat. Turn Paulus ac Petrus capitis damnati; 
quorum uni cervix gladio desecta, Petrus in crucem sublatus est. — 
Ibid. e. 41. 

Augustine, a.d. 430. 

Cathedra tibi quid fecit ecclesise Pomanse in qua Petrus sedit et in 
qua hodie Anastasius sedet? — Contra, lit. Petil. lib. 2, c. 51. 

Jacet Petri corpus Bomse, dicunt homines. Jacet Pauli corpus 
Pomse ; Laurentii corpus Pomse ; aliorum sanctorum martyrum cor- 
pora jacent Romse, et misera est Eoma! . . . Tot strages mortis fiunt, 
ubi sunt memorise Apostolorum! — Quid dicis? — JSerm. in Natali Apostol. 

Paulinus of Nola. a.d. 431. 

Ipsaque celestum 
Sacris procerum monumentis Eoma 
Petro Pauloque potens. 

Natal. 3. 



a list of all the writers, etc. 27 

Cyril of Alexandria, a.d. 444. 
Sozomen. a.d. 450. 

QXiyov (Je y^povov $iXr)Kog £7n€iu)(ravTog, fiovog Att>Epiog Ttjg EKicXrjaiag 
{ev Pwur?) Trpoicrraro. Tavrrj ttt] tov Qeov dioucrjaavTog, u)(tte top Uerpov 
Spovov fir] adoZeiv, viro hvo r\y£\Jtoaiv iQvvofJLEvov' 6 Stypvoiag (TVfit>oXov 
£<rrij ko.1 EKK\r](TiacrTiKOv Sefffjiov aXkoTpiov.—Hist. iv. 14. 

Orosius. a.d. 450. 

Exordio regni ejus (Claudii) Petrus Apostolus . . . Romam venit, 
et salutarem cunctis credentibus fidem fideli verbo docuit, potentissimis- 
que virtutibus adprobavit. — lib. 7, c. 6. 

Palladius. a.d. 450. 

Nepwvog tov (3ci(Ti\eu)Q — tov KoXacravTog tovq aoidi/uovg anovToXovg 
UsTpov /ecu IlavXov. — De Brachmanibus. 

Petrus Chrysologus. a.d. 452. 
Theodoret. a.d. 457. 

E^ei %e /cat Tiov koivojv naTEpcov /cat dtdaaicaXwv Tr\g aXr)deiag IlETpov 
jccu IlavXov Tag drjKag tojv 7tl(TT(i)V Tag ipvyag (pu)Tt£ov(Tag. 'Hce Tpi&fxa- 
Kapia tovtu)v Kai Osia ^vvojpig avETeiXe \xev ev tt) eu>a Kai -rravTOcre Tag 
atCTivag e^ette^ev' ev 'Se tt] Svctei Trpodvfuog f£e£aro Tag tov fiiov hvapag, 
kqkeiQev vvv KaTavya^Ei tt)v oiKovfiEvrjv. 'Ourot jjlev tov vfXETEpov wEpKpa- 
vegtotov aTrstyrjvav Qpovov. 'OvTOg Tiav ayada)v rav vfiETEpwv 6 koXoQojv. 

'O ft' EKELVWV OEOg Kai VVV TOV £K£IVU)V sXajlTTpWE dpOVOV, TTjV VfiETEpaV 

ayiio(rvvr)v ISpvaag e,v tovtu>j Trjg opdocHoZiag rag oxTivag atyuicrav. — Epist. 
ad Leonem. 

Leo. a.d. 461. 

Hodierna festivitas, prseter illam reverentiam, quam toto terrarum 
orbe promeruit, speciali et propria nostrse urbis exultatione veneranda 
est, ut ubi prsecipuorum Apostolorum glorificatus est exitus, ibi in die 
Martyrii eorum sit lsetitiae principatus. — Serm. 1 de Natali Apost, 

Prosper, a.d. 463. 
Maximus. a.d. 465. 

fetxtf) GDenturg. 
Elpis. a.d. 520. 

O felix Roma ! — quae tantorum principum, 
Es purpurata pretioso sanguine, 



28 A LIST OF ALL THE WRITERS, ETC. 

Non laude tua, sed ipsorum meritis 
Excellis omnem mundi pulckritudinem. 

Hymn, de Apostolis. 

Abator, a.d. 556. 

Dignaque materies Petri Paulique coronae 
Csesareas superare minas, et in arce tyranni 
Pandere jura Poli, summumque in agone tribunal 
Vincere, ne titulos parvus contingeret hostis. 

Act. Apost. in fine. 

Gregory of Tours, a.d. 595. 

Nero Petrum cruce, Paulum gladio jubet interfici. — lib. 1, c. 25. 

Gregory the Great, a.d. 604. 

Itaque cum multi sint Apostoli, pro ipso tamen principatu sola 
Apostolorum principis sedes in auctoritate convaluit, qua3 in tribus 
locis unius est. Ipse enim sublimavit sedeni in qua etiam quiescere 
et prsesentem vitam finire dignatus est. Ipse decoravit sedeni, in 
quam Evangelistam discipulum misit. Ipse firmavit sedeni in qua 
septem annos quamvis discessurus sedit. Cum ergo unius atque una 
sit sedes, cui ex auctoritate divina tres nunc Episcopi president, quid- 
quid ego de vobis boni audio, hoc mini imputo, si quid de me boni 
creditis, hoc vestris meritis imputate, quia unum sumus, &c. — lib. 6, 
Epist. 40. 

Isidore of Spain, a.d. 636. 

Septimo et tricesimo anno post passionem Domini a Nerone Caesare 
in urbe Roma deorsum verso capite, ut ipse vomit, crucifixus est. — 
In Vit. Petri. 

The Golden Legend, a.d. 1298. 



PART I. 

THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 



I. 

The Krjpvy/iia Tlerpov, (a.d. 45,) called in English 
"Peter's Proclamation," " Preaching, " or "Doctrine," 
and in Latin " Prsedicatio Petri," " Doctrina Petri," &c., 
was a document which appeared against the Gnostic 
heresy among the Gentiles at Rome, before the siege of 
Jerusalem, and even as early as the reign of Claudius. 
It seems to have contained an account of the doctrines 
taught by Peter and the apostles in Judaea, with some 
of our Lord's predictions respecting the destruction of 
Jerusalem, and to have been looked upon by the earlier 
Fathers as really the production of St. Peter himself, or 
at least as having been authorized by him. Clement, the 
eminent bishop of Alexandria, in the beginning of the 
third century, quotes a good deal from it as such. 
Eusebius also considered it in the same light, although 
he says that the authenticity of the work extant under 
that name in his time was by no means universally ac- 
knowledged, — Origen having rejected it as spurious, 
and none of the quotations cited by the bishop of Alex- 
andria being discoverable in it. The original authentic 
document was, he tells us, (Hist. 2, 14), sent to Rome 
by St. Peter himself, a little before he went to Babylon, 
for the purpose of counteracting the Gnostic heresy in 



30 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

that city, in the reign of Claudius; and this historian 
has written a whole chapter respecting its success there 
upon that occasion, with the title " On the Krjpvy/ma 
HeTpov at Rome." Lactantius also bears witness that 
this work was sent to Rome prior to the destruction of 
Jerusalem, and, therefore, during the apostle's lifetime ; 
that it contained our Lord's predictions relative to that 
event, and that it was the means adopted by the apostles 
(or, according to the usual expression, " by Peter and 
Paul") to announce these predictions in that city, in such 
a way that they might be afterwards seen to be such. ( Ea 
Prsedicatio, in memoriam scripta, permansit. Lactantius, 
Institut. 4, 21.) I draw attention to these particulars 
respecting the book called " Peter's Proclamation," be- 
cause its name seems to have been one of the main 
sources of the modern error about Peter's having left 
the East. As to its supposed testimony, however, upon 
this subject, the book in question is not now extant, nor 
is there any extract from it in which it is pretended that 
there is the slightest allusion to anything of the kind. 
Baratier and Bishop Pearson, who alone cite it as autho- 
rity in this case, admit that there is not, but think that 
it must have contained some such passage, as Lactantius 
seems to say so. But Lactantius says exactly the re- 
verse. Lactantius says : " Christ disclosed some predic- 
tions to His disciples, of which the apostles made public 
proclamation at Rome; and that Proclamation (ea Prse- 
dicatio) being in writing, to perpetuate the predictions, 
was still extant after their fulfilment. In this pro- 
clamation, among many other extraordinary things, 
they said (in qua dixerunt) that Providence would soon 
send a king to exterminate the Jews," &c. (Lact. Instit. 
4, 21.) Does not Lactantius here say as distinctly as 
he could well have said it, that it was not in person, but 
in the written document called " Peter's Proclamation " 
that the apostles publicly announced our Lord's predic- 
tions among the Gentiles at Rome upon the occasion 
alluded to? And does he not thereby corroborate the 
account given by Eusebius, that this document was sent 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 31 

to Rome by Peter, a little before the final departure of 
the apostles from Jerusalem? In all which, however, 
we have not a shadow of reason for supposing, either 
that "Peter's Proclamation" contained anything about 
Peter's being in Europe, or that Lactantius was under 
the impression that it did. 

Some writers seem to have considered that " Paul's 
Proclamation" and "Peter's Proclamation" were two 
distinct works ; others that Peter and Paul were the joint 
authors of the same work; and others, with more pro- 
bability, that Paul's name became connected with a work 
exclusively under Peter's name, from a mistake on the 
part of Lactantius, who was a Latin writer, with regard 
to a Greek passage in Clemens Alexandrinus, by whom 
this work was so often quoted. That point, however, 
has nothing to do with the present question. 



II. 

St. Linus (a.d. 70) a bishop of Rome, is one of those 
upon whose testimony the Roman Catholics have been 
taught to believe that Peter was not put to death on the 
Euphrates, at the ancient Babylon, in the territory of 
the king of Parthia, where Peter himself says that he 
was living in expectation of his martyrdom in the reign 
of Nero, at the very time that he was writing his epistles 
to the other districts of the Dispersion. In the work 
attributed to this bishop on Peter's crucifixion, it is said 
that Peter was put to death by Agrippa, in a city where 
Agrippa was the governor, and that Nero was very much 
annoyed when he came to hear of the apostle's death, 
and sent Agrippa into retirement, where he died. The 
MSS. of this document are said to mention Rome and 
not Jerusalem as the scene of the story; but Agrippa 
was never governor of Rome. As, however, the work in 
question is confessedly a recent production, I need do 
no more than show that father Ceillier, and all the Roman 
clergy, now admit that it affords no indications of Peter's 



32 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

not having been put to death, as is intimated in the 
Scriptures, in Parthia, — that they consider it full of the 
absurdest fictions, and that St. Linus had nothing what- 
ever to do with the composition of it. 

Father Ceillier (vol. 1. p. 490) says : " The work that 
we have in two books, under the name of St. Linus, 
is full of ridiculous fables, and is not even worth 
reading." 

Father Tillemont, in his fifty-first article on St. Paul, 
says of this document — u It is one of the worst invented 
pieces that ever were written." Again, in his sixtieth 
note on St. Paul : "It signifies very little what this work 
asserts, or what it denies." And again, in his chapter 
on the first Popes : " This work is full of errors. Ba- 
ronius maintains that it is a forgery, or at least very 
much corrupted, if it ever was authentic — and several 
other writers pronounce the same judgment." 

Cardinal Bellarmine, in his Ecclesiastical Writers, 
says, — " We consider that Linus's writings are not 
extant, and that those which now pass under his name 
are forgeries." 

The Dominican Fathers Richard and Giraud, in their 
Bibliotheque Sacree, remark : " The two books which 
bear the name of Linus, about Peter's martyrdom, are 
forgeries, as well as being full of fictions and heresies." 

As far, therefore, as Linus's testimony is concerned, 
there is no reason to suppose that Peter was not put to 
death at Babylon. 



III. 

Anacletus, (a.d. 91,) also a bishop of Rome, is another 
of those upon whose testimony the Roman Catholics 
have been taught to rely for the alleged fact that Peter 
left the lost sheep of the house of Israel to come and 
live in Europe. Three decretals (or papal briefs) have 
been attributed to Anacletus, the MSS. of which are said 
to contain words to this effect ; but the recent origin of 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 33 

these documents has been for many years placed beyond 
all doubt, and the Roman clergy, without one exception, 
now admit that whatever they contain, they cannot any 
longer be considered as affording the alleged evidence, 
inasmuch as there is not the least pretext for supposing 
them to have been written by Anacletus. 

Father Tillemont says, — " We have three decretals 
under the name of St. Anacletus. We do not examine 
them. All the learned are agreed now-a-days that these 
letters are frauds and forgeries, (fausses et supposees,) 
and that all the decretal letters attributed to the popes 
that lived prior to Pope Siricius (a.d. 385) are equally 
so." 

Father Dupin, in his chapter on the false decretals, 
says : " The first epistle attributed to Pope Anacletus is 
evidently a forgery." (He here assigns eight grounds 
for this opinion.) "Nor is there less proof that the 
second letter attributed to Anacletus is an imposture 
also." (He here assigns five grounds.) " And, for the 
same reasons, we must pass the same judgment upon the 
third letter attributed to this pope." 

The Dominican fathers, in their Bibliotheque Sacree, 
say, — " All the decretals attributed to the popes who 
preceded Siricius are considered by the learned as 
forgeries." 

It is unnecessary to multiply these quotations from 
the Roman-catholic authorities. They are all now 
agreed that Feuardent was wrong, and that Anacletus 
has not left one word to justify the supposition that the 
apostle Peter ever came to Europe. 



IV. 

Clemens Romanus (a.d. 100), another bishop of Rome, 
is supposed to have said that Peter did not undergo his 
martyrdom at Babylon, in Parthia; but it will be seen 
that he does not say so, and that he does not even say 

D 



34 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

anything from which this could be inferred; but quite 
the reverse. His words addressed to the Corinthians 
are (after adverting to Moses and other pious persons 
mentioned in the Old Testament) : " But to leave the 
examples of antiquity, and to come to the most modern, 
let us take the noble examples of our own times. Let 
us place before our eyes the good apostles. Peter, 
through unjust dislike, underwent not one or two, but 
many sufferings ; and having undergone his martyrdom, 
he went to the place of glory that was due to him. 
Paul, also, having seven times worn chains and been 
hunted and stoned, received the prize of such endurance. 
For he was herald of the gospel in the West as well as 
in the East, and enjoyed the illustrious reputation of 
the faith, in teaching, as he did, the whole world to be 
righteous. And when he came to the remotest limits 
of the West, he underwent his martyrdom before the 
governors of mankind ; and thus freed from this world, 
went to his holy place, the most brilliant example of 
steadfastness that we possess," (c. 5.) 

The first question that here suggests itself is, why is 
Paul's journey into Europe and Paul's martyrdom at 
Kome, so pointedly stated in the very same paragraph 
in which nothing more is said of Peter's travels or of 
Peter's martyrdom than what manifestly pre-supposes 
the Scripture account about his going to the Jews of 
the Dispersion, as he was directed by his divine Master, 
and about his being put to death at Babylon, as his own 
epistles intimate? How is it that Clement makes no 
allusion to a residence in Europe, or even to a mar- 
tyrdom there for the apostle of the circumcision as well 
as for the apostle of the Gentiles? Peter's martyrdom 
took place in Clement's lifetime. How is it that Clement 
never heard of anything connected with it at variance 
with the facts that are laid before us in the Scriptures? 
But we do not inquire for the evidences of Peter's having 
lived and died as is indicated in the sacred text. Our 
inquiry is for the alleged evidence of his not having 
done so. 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 35 

Father M c Corry's view of Clement's words is wholly 
founded upon a textual misapprehension, very pardon- 
able under the solicitude that he naturally felt about the 
question in which he was engaged, though avoided by 
all his more cautious predecessors. He supposes St. 
Clement to speak of the martyrs that had fallen in his 
own city; whereas Clement speaks of those who had 
fallen within the memory of that present generation. 
" Let us look at the illustrious examples of our own 
age," says the bishop of Eome; " let us take, for in- 
stance, the apostles." 

The Correspondent in the Times, Mr. Baratier, and 
others, adopt another view of the passage. They argue 
that if Peter was put to death at all by the Jews, it 
must have been in Europe ; — that it was not likely that 
Nero either would or could persecute the Christians 
through the Jews within the territories of Parthia, of 
which Babylonia was a province, or in short, anywhere 
except in Europe ; and that, therefore, as Peter fell in 
Nero's persecution, he must have perished to the west 
of Judsea. Whereas, it can be proved from Roman- 
catholic records that Babylon was, at the time of Peter's 
martyrdom, in the most abject dependence upon the 
will of Nero ; that Nero's persecution of the Christians 
was carried on not only by imperial edict, which took 
effect throughout all the Asiatic provinces of the empire, 
but that it was also carried on within the jurisdiction of 
the states dependent upon the empire; and that there 
was, during that persecution, a large and violent faction 
of the Jews at Babylon in an extreme state of exaspera- 
tion against the leaders of the Christians in that city. 
I shall presently adduce evidence upon these three 
points ; but let us first attend, once for all, to the facts 
which we have in Scripture, as to Peter's martyrdom, 
and the country in which it occurred. We shall then 
be in a better condition to j udge of the amount of testi- 
mony requisite to meet the inferences drawn from Cle- 
ment's words by the Correspondent in the Times, Father 
M c Corry, Baratier, and the other writers on their side. 

d 2 



36 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

In John xxi. 18 and 19, we have our Lord's pre- 
diction that Peter was to be crucified with his head 
downwards, in his old age. The manner of the cruci- 
fixion we gather from the girdle (or zone) put on after 
the person was fastened to the cross by the hands and 
feet with nails, or by the wrists and ancles with cords. 
In the ordinary posture of crucifixion the body was not 
sustained (as *s commonly supposed), and could not 
possibly be sustained, by the fastenings of the hands 
alone, but was also supported by a seat, or rest, at the 
middle of the cross, as we learn from Justin Martyr, 
and other early writers. This is well known to divines. 
" On the middle of the upright part of the cross," says 
Mr. Barnes, on the New Testament (Matt, xxvii. 35), 
" there was a projection or seat, on which the person 
crucified sat, or, as it were, rode. This was necessary, 
as the hands were not alone strong enough to bear the 
weight of the body, as the body was left exposed often 
many days." Home, also, in his Introduction to the 
Holy Scriptures (in the chapter on Crucifixion), says: 
" There was a piece of wood that projected from the 
middle of the cross, on which the person sat as on a sort 
of saddle, and by which the whole body was supported. 
Justin Martyr, in his Dialogue with Trypho the Jew, 

gives this description The person was permitted 

to hang (the whole weight of his body being borne up 
by his nailed hands and feet, and by the projecting 
piece in the middle of the cross) until he perished 
through agony and want of food." When the posture 
of the body was reversed it was necessary to adopt a 
different expedient for supporting its weight. This is 
the girdle alluded to in our Lord's words, with which 
the whole body at the hips was bound to the cross, and 
which was put on before the cross was set up in the 
hole dug for it. " The limbs of persons crucified," 
says Mr. Barnes, on our Lord's prediction of Peter's 
death, " were often bound or tied to the cross, instead 
of being nailed; and even the body was sometimes 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 37 

girded to the cross." Mr. Barnes does not seem to per- 
ceive the intention of the " girding;" but that this 
posture was considered (at least as late as the middle 
ages,) to be implied in our Lord's prediction, may be 
seen in the work on " the Destruction of Jerusalem," 
which was once erroneously attributed to Hegesippus — 
u Peter was crucified (says this book) with his head 
downwards, at his own request ; either because it was so 
it was to happen, as Christ had predicted it, or be- 
cause his persecutors willingly granted him an increase 
of torture." (De excidio Urbis Hierosol. iii. 2.) And 
with regard to this mode of crucifying the Christians 
with the head downwards, Eusebius (a.d. 340) tells us 
in the eighth and twelfth chapters of his eighth Book, 
that it was not a very unusual practice in the countries 
in which the Jews had the ascendancy ; and that on the 
Euphrates, even a little before his own time, in the dis- 
tricts around Babylon, smoking wood was often placed 
near the head of the victim thus suspended, in order to 
aggravate the sufferings or to accelerate the death. 

Then as to the scriptural indication of Parthia, as 
the scene of Peter's martyrdom. In Matthew xxiii. 34, 
our Lord told the Jews that among their other mis- 
deeds they would crucify some of his apostles, and all 
the fathers understood Peter to be one of these here 
referred to as martyrs to be crucified in cities where the 
Jewish population had sufficient authority for that pur- 
pose. St. Jerome, in his commentary on these words, 
illustrates them by saying, — u They crucified Peter." 
Nicolaus de Lyra, an eminent theologian of the 14th 
century, paraphrases the verse thus : " Some of them 
you will kill, as James, and Stephen, and many more; 
and others you will crucify, as Peter and Andrew." 
But it is unnecessary to enlarge on this. JSfo Roman- 
catholic writer has ever denied that what our Lord here 
says, he says of Peter and to the Jews. 

Again, from the following texts, Matthew, x. 5, 6, and 
23; xxviii. 19. Mark, xvi. 15. John, xxi. 15, 16, and 17. 



38 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

Acts, ii. 5 ; ix. 15 ; xi. 2 and 3. Galat. ii. 7, &c. ; 1 Pet. 
ii. 25; v. 1, &c , we learn that our Lord told Peter to 
confine himself in his travels as much as possible to the 
Jews of the Dispersion, and to those cities in which these 
were in the greatest numbers ; to seek out these cities 
of Israel in whatever nation of the earth they were to 
be found, but to confine himself to them (other apostles 
being appointed for the Gentiles) ; not, indeed, to reject 
the Gentiles when they came, yet not to go to Gentile 
nations, and not to stop even in Samaria, though he 
must of course pass through it, but to go rather to 
"the lost sheep of the house of Israel;" an expression 
which the prophets of old applied only to the Jews of 
Babylon and the adjoining provinces, and which no 
Jewish Christian would otherwise interpret. The Scrip- 
ture records on this point are too explicit to require any 
comment. 

Finally, from 1 Pet. i. 1 ; iv. 12 ; v. 13 ; and from 2 Pet. 
i. 14, we learn that this indefatigable apostle fulfilled to 
the letter our Lord's commands. After having taken one 
of the much-frequented routes from Antioch to Mesopo- 
tamia, we find him established, and Mark the Evangelist 
with him, upon the Euphrates, amidst all the ancestral 
associations and desolate magnificence of Babylon, the 
head quarters of the Dispersion, and where the hereditary 
patriarch of the Dispersion lived — seeking there to 
spiritualize the expectations of the Parthian Jews, who 
still looked with impatience for the conquest of the world 
— writing letters from there, exhorting " the lost sheep' 7 
in the surrounding provinces to return to their " Shep- 
herd" (meaning Christ), announcing to them that the 
fulfilment of our Lord's prediction respecting him (Peter) 
was at hand; that Nero's persecution of the Christians, 
from which they were all suffering, had reached Parthia 
where he was ; and that he was looking forward to an 
almost immediate martyrdom, but that he would en- 
deavour to have them kept in remembrance of his 
advice after his death: in consequence of which, the 
First Epistle General of St. John, who survived Peter 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 39 

some twenty or thirty years, originally appeared as " The 
Epistle to the Parthians," is so described still in many of 
the early MSS., and is now looked upon as such by all 
the Roman clergy. With these scriptural indications 
before us, we cannot wonder if we find that so early a 
writer as Clement had heard nothing of the alleged resi- 
dence u in the West," or of the alleged martyrdom " be- 
fore the sovereigns of mankind." 

Let us now attend to the argument put forward by 
such of the Roman clergy as rely, with the Correspondent 
in the Times and Baratier, on this passage of Clemens 
Romanus for Peter's not having been put to death at 
Babylon. It resolves itself, as has been seen, into these 
two propositions: that the king of Parthia would not 
have submitted to Nero's dictation; and that Nero him- 
self did not seek to persecute the Christian churches 
beyond the confines of Europe. On the first point the 
chief authorities are Josephus, Tacitus, and Dio Cassius ; 
on the second, Orosius, Sulpitius, the Younger Pliny, 
and Tertullian; all which authorities are approved of 
and quoted upon these two points, though upon occa- 
sions somewhat different, by Father Palma, Cardinal 
Baronius, Father Calmet, Father Tillemont, and all the 
rest of the Roman clergy who have written upon this 
persecution. 

1. As to the relations between Parthia and Rome, the 
account given by Tacitus is transcribed in most of its 
details, by Tillemont in his " History of the Emperors," 
where, in his reigns of Claudius and Nero, this writer 
states that Yardanes was king of Parthia, and holding 
his court at Babylon, when Apollonius of Tyana was 
there in the early part of the reign of Claudius ; that 
the Parthians sent an embassy to Claudius to beg of him 
to restore to the throne of Parthia the young Parthian 
prince, who was at that time a hostage at Rome ; that 
Claudius sent the prince to Cassius, his governor in 
Syria, which adjoined Parthia, to convey him safe into 
the hands of the Parthian nobles at Zeugma, a frontier 
town on the Euphrates, the usual rendezvous between 



40 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

the authorities of Rome and Parthia ; that this manoeuvre 
being unsuccessful, Vologaeses was made king of Parthia, 
and conferred two of his provinces as kingdoms upon 
his two brothers, giving Armenia to Tiridates and 
Media to Pacorus, a.d. 51. Tillemont then proceeds to 
tell of the war carried on by the Parthians and Armenians 
against Corbulo, the distinguished general that Nero had 
on the Euphrates, respecting the crown of Armenia, 
which Nero had taken from the King of Parthia and his 
brother — of the complete success of the imperial army — 
and of the King of Parthia's being compelled to send 
his brother, Tiridates, with hostages to Rome, to Nero, 
to conclude a peace with him, and to receive from the 
Emperor the disputed crown, a.d. 66. Tillemont adds, 
that on that occasion Nero closed the Temple of Janus, 
as the peace of the empire was secured by this submis- 
sion of the king of Parthia; and that it was in the 
middle of the following year that Peter's martyrdom 
took place. 

This event Niebuhr thus records : " Another war 
which occurred in the reign of Nero is that of Corbulo 
against the Parthians. Corbulo conducted it with uni- 
form success, and the Parthian king was compelled to 
consent to holding his kingdom as a fief of the Roman 
emperor. Tiridates himself came to Rome, and was re- 
ceived in the most magnificent manner, and obtained 
the diadem (of Armenia) from Nero." 

Dio Cassius (lib. lxiii. c. 1) says: " When Tiridates 
came to Rome, he had with him not only his own sons, 
but those of his brother, the king of Parthia ; those also 
of his other brother, the king of Media, and those of 
Monobazus, the king of Adiabene (another state depen- 
dent upon Parthia) ; and their whole journey from the 
Euphrates was like a triumphal progress." We are not 
told that these children returned with Tiridates. 

Josephus gives us, in his Wars, ii. 2, a report of King 
Agrippa's speech to the Jews of Jerusalem (a.d. 66), 
from which the following passages are selected, urging 
them to remain in submission to Nero, and warning them 



THE ANTENICENE RECOEDS. 41 

to reflect that even the Parthians had their hostages at 
Rome. This was the Jewish king before whom St. Paul 
made his celebrated appeal to Nero. . . . " Numberless 
other nations (said Agrippa) armed with higher claims 
to freedom than you have, receive the yoke. You alone 
disdain servitude to those to whom the whole universe 
has submitted. . . . Will you not reflect on the empire 
of the Romans? Will you not measure your own weak- 
ness? . . . For the entire Euphrates has not sufficed 
them on the east, nor the Danube on the north. . . . 
What of the five hundred cities of Asia? Do they not, 
though ungarrisoned, do homage to the emperor and to 
the fasces of the consuls? . . . How strong a plea may 
Bithynia and Cappadocia put in for freedom ? and yet they 
pay their tribute without force of arms. . . . But why 
need I enlarge, while even the Parthians, that most war- 
like race, lords of so many nations, and invested with so 
mighty a dominion, send hostages to Rome? And thus 
in Italy you may behold under the guise of peace, the 
noblest born of the East in submission to the yoke. . . . 
What help then will you obtain from the uninhabited 
quarters of the earth, for all the inhabited portion belongs 
to Rome? unless, possibly, some of you extend your 
hopes beyond the Euphrates, and suppose that your kin- 
dred will bring you aid from Adiabene. But they will 
neither involve themselves on any frivolous pretext in a 
war so serious, nor were they so unadvisedly disposed, 
would the king of Parthia permit them, for he is care- 
ful to maintain the truce with the Romans, and would 
deem himself a violator of the treaty, should any under 
him rise in arms against them." (Where see much more 
to the same effect.) 

We have here, in glaring colours, not only the utter 
subjection of the Parthians to Nero, and of the Jews of 
Babylon to the Parthians, about the time of Peter's 
death among them, but ample evidence of the two great 
factions which at this time subsisted among the Jews in 
all the cities of the East, and of which, no doubt, Nero's 
emissaries availed themselves in the persecution of the 



42 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

Christians, — one faction intent upon submission to the 
emperor, the other upon war ; and the Christian church 
at Babylon, inculcating, as Peter did, submission, was 
placed between these two parties, as it were between two 
fires. For on the one hand it was exposed to the co- 
operation of the peaceable Jews at Babylon, with the 
commissioners of the emperor, and on the other to the 
bitterest hostility of the discontented Jews there, who, 
with the distinguished Silas at their head, were strain- 
ing every nerve (as Josephus elsewhere informs us) to 
arouse their fellow-citizens to a war with Rome. It may 
also be observed, that Josephus further attests the abject 
condition of the Parthians, with respect to the Romans 
at this time, when he subsequently states that even four 
years later, after Jerusalem had fallen, the same Yolo- 
gasses, the king of Parthia, sent an embassy of con- 
gratulation to meet Titus at Zeugma, on the Euphrates, 
and to present him with a crown of gold. 

2. As to the extent of the persecution, Cardinal 
Baronius says, in his " Ecclesiastical Annals," (a.d. 68, 
paragraph 45), a It was not only at Rome and in the 
places adjoining to that city, but in other States and 
in other provinces (sed in aliis civitatibus atque pro- 
vinces), that we find the Christians to have suffered 
martyrdom in this reign of Nero ; for Orosius, the his- 
torian, tells us that orders were given by Nero that the 
Christians should be persecuted throughout all the de- 
pendencies of the empire with as much severity as at 
Rome (pari persecutione. ) The names of these martyrs 
have been almost all lost, as the Ecclesiastical Records 
were burnt by the Emperor Diocletian; so that only 
very few of them are mentioned in the Roman Martyro- 
logy. But to say nothing of the rest, (for we cannot 
undertake to give an account of all the martyrs of all 
the churches,) let us now treat of the events which 
took place in our own church." And again (a.d. 69, 
paragraph 46), " That Nero's persecution was carried 
on with the greatest imaginable severity, not only in 
the capital, but throughout the whole world then under 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 43 

the sway of Rome (toto orbe Romano), has been clearly 
shown," &c. &c. 

Orosius, the ancient historian referred to by the 
cardinal, says: (7.6) " Nero was the first who visited 
the Christians at Rome with penalties and death ; and 
he gave orders that they should be persecuted with 
equal severity throughout all the territories that were 
dependent upon Rome." 

Sulpitius Severus, another ancient writer, says to the 
same effect (lib. ii) : — " General laws were passed (datis 
legibus) to forbid the religion, and imperial proclama- 
tions were issued, (palam edictis propositis) prohibiting 
mankind from professing Christianity." 

Father Calmet, in his " Dictionary of the Bible," also 
admits that it was not confined to Italy. " Nero," says 
he, " permitted his own gardens to be the scene of 
all these cruelties (immediately after the fire, a.d. 
64). From this time edicts were published against the 
Christians, and many martyrs suffered, especially in 
Italy. We have mentioned the death of St. Peter and 
St. Paul consequent on this persecution, which probably 
continued to the demise of Nero, a.d. 68, the 14th year 
of his reign." 

Father Palma, of the College of the Propaganda at 
Rome, says, in the first volume of his " Ecclesiastical 
History," (p. 32, &c.) " But it must not be supposed 
that this affliction of the Christian church was circum- 
scribed within the limits of the capital, for it cannot be 
doubted that the Christians were then persecuted in all 
the countries conquered by the Romans (in universis 
Imperii Romani provinciis)." Again, of the notion that 
martyrdoms only took place in Europe, he adds : " That 
this notion is manifestly false and utterly at variance 
with the history of those times, has been shown with 
the clearest evidence." He also cites the chapter from 
Tacitus upon this persecution, from which he says, 
u it is evident that Nero's cruelties were not confined to 
the church of Rome, but extended, without exception, 
to all the Christian churches that were within the terri- 



44 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

tories subject to his authority, not so much in conse- 
quence of the fire attributed to the Christians, as because 
they were looked upon as the common enemies of man- 
kind." He also aptly illustrates the point with the case 
of Bithynia, one of the provinces of the Dispersion with 
which Peter was in communication, as being dependent 
upon the Jewish patriarch of Babylon ; and where Pliny 
the Younger, half a century after Nero's time, found the 
same laws and edicts still in force against the Christians. 
But these authorities on this persecution are familiar to 
most readers. Pliny's Correspondence with the Emperor 
Trajan, on the laws in question, is thus referred to by 
Tertullian (a.d. 250) : u Those statutes, which only the 
unjust and impious carry out against us, and which to 
some extent were annulled by Trajan, when he gave 
orders to the authorities that they should not endea- 
vour to eind out the Christians." (Yetando inquiri 
Christianos, chap, v.) 

Thus we see that Nero's persecution was universal; 
that Parthia was in complete subjection to Nero at the 
time of Peter's crucifixion there ; that it was usual for 
the imperial commissioners, at that time, not only to 
put to death the Christians that were brought to them, 
but to track them out and arrest them wherever they 
could be found; and that the Christian church at 
Babylon, as well as in all the other Jewish cities, had 
the whole of the war party in the fiercest hostility 
against it. It is evident, therefore, that when Clemens 
Romanus merely says that Peter was put to death, he 
does not contradict the intimations given us in Scrip- 
ture, about his having been put to death in Parthia, but 
confirms them. 

There will be found in the third chapter on Eusebius, 
some important particulars respecting the condition of 
Babylon at the period of Peter's martyrdom there, 
which have been collected from the writings of his con- 
temporaries, and which have been unaccountably over- 
looked by the generality of modern writers. Suffice it 
to say here, that Babylon was then the same peculiarly 



THE ANTEXICEXE RECORDS. 45 

constructed city as ever; consisting, as from its first 
foundation, of an enclosed area of about 200 square 
miles ; of which the greater part was, as it always had 
been, laid out in pasture, tillage, and plantations, little 
more than a twentieth part of the whole being occupied 
with the dwellings of the inhabitants, and these for the 
most part detached from one another; that it was then, 
as has been seen, within the Parthian territory; that it 
was used as a country residence by the kings of Parthia, 
one of its palaces being not only kept in repair, but 
handsomely decorated ; that its population was not 
much less than half a million, and that half of these 
were Jews ; that though not adapted for military pur- 
poses, the kings of Parthia kept a garrison there ; and 
that even half a century after Peter's time, when the 
Emperor Trajan went there, he was obliged to take it by 
force of arms, as Dio Cassius and Eutropius inform us, 
and placed a Roman garrison in it, in order to retain 
it. Theodoret (a.d. 459), one of the bishops on the 
Euphrates, remarks, in his Commentary on the thirteenth 
chapter of Isaiah, that Babylon in his day was wholly 
inhabited by Jews; and St. Chrysostom reminds us 
that there were Jews from Babylon among those Par- 
thians who were at Jerusalem when St. Peter commenced 
his foundation of the churches at the Feast of Pentecost, 
immediately after the Ascension (Acts ii. 9). 



y. 

Ignatius (a.d. 107), archbishop of Antioch, in his letter 
to the Eomans, dated from Smyrna, where he was at the 
time, says, that he does not think himself entitled to 
address a Christian church with as much authority as 
Peter and Paul did, because they were apostles, which 
he was not. " Not as Peter and Paul," said Ignatius, 
" do I give you directions. They are apostles ; I am 
condemned. They are free ; I am still a slave. But if 
I suffer, I also shall be free." (chap, iv.) Bishop Pearson 



46 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

and Mr. Baratier, to whom the Correspondent in the 
Times refers us, considered that these words afford 
reason to suppose that Ignatius thought Peter had been 
in Europe at some period of his history, as well as Paul, 
whether we suppose this to have been after or before he 
went to Babylon. "If it were not so," asks Baratier, 
" why did Ignatius name the two apostles together? or 
why did he name Peter at all, if Peter had no more to 
do with Roman Christians than St. James or St. John, 
who never were at Rome?" 

The answer to the first question is, that in the fathers 
of this period Peter is, as all admit, and as we have 
already had occasion to observe, very frequently named 
alone as representative of all the twelve apostles of our 
Lord, who were mainly and primarily to occupy them- 
selves with the conversion of the Jews, partly for the 
convenience of the expression, and partly because he was 
considered, as Eusebius tells us, one of the most able and 
energetic of the twelve, (it not being imagined until 
long subsequently, that our Lord had assigned him an 
ascendancy above the rest), just in the same way as 
although there were many apostles of the Gentiles, Paul 
is constantly named alone as their representative. So 
that these two names combined, as they so frequently 
are in the Fathers, were merely used to designate in a 
brief form all the original instructors of the Christian 
churches ; and the reader will perceive that this expres- 
sion has, from its frequency, greatly contributed (as 
Pearson and Baratier here so ingenuously avow), to the 
preposterous inference that, as the one apostle certainly 
was in Europe, the other apostle must have been there 
likewise. The answer to the second question is, that 
even if Peter had nothing to do with the Roman 
Christians, and had never taught any of them, Ignatius 
might nevertheless have very naturally said, " I do not 
give you directions as if I were Peter (or as Peter 
might have done), for I am not an apostle." This lan- 
guage would not in the least imply that Peter had ever 
addressed a word to the Roman Christians. But besides 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 47 

this, it is quite a mistake to assume that Peter could 
have had no connexion with the Roman Christians — 
could never have addressed — never have converted any 
of them, if he had strictly obeyed our Lord's commands, 
in confining himself to the cities that were most fre- 
quented by the Jews. We learn, from the second chap- 
ter of the Acts of the Apostles, (as I shall show more 
at large in the section on Irenasus,) that, before he ever 
left Judaea, he, " standing up with the Eleven," made 
the first converts, laid the first foundations, and taught 
the first doctrines of the church of Rome ; nor shall we 
be mistaken if we assume that a very large (if not the 
larger) portion of the Romans, who were Christians, when 
St. Paul wrote to them, had been at one time or another 
Peter's auditors at Jerusalem. Thus, even if the words 
of Ignatius must be supposed to imply that Peter, as 
well as Paul, addressed discourses to the Romans, we 
find from Scripture that he did so without having 
neglected for that purpose the special mission entrusted 
to him by our Lord. 

Neither Cardinal Baronius nor Cardinal Bellarmine, 
nor even Father Feuardent, considered that much de- 
pendence was to be placed upon anything in Ignatius to 
prove the point they were so anxious to establish, for they 
do not mention him ; nor do I know of any Roman-catholic 
writer, except Father M c Corry, and the Correspondent 
in the Times, who adopts this very unsatisfactory argu- 
ment of Baratier's, as a " demonstration" that St. Peter 
must have left the East and gone into Europe at some 
period of his history. 



VI. 



Papias (a.d. 110), bishop of Hieropolis, in Phrygia, is 
regarded by Baronius, and all the writers on his side, 
as veiy valuable testimony about Peter's having been 
with Mark in Europe; but most fortunately for that 
great scriptural fact, which this writer is supposed to 



48 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

contradict, we have his own very words, and in them 
he says nothing whatever about Peter's having left 
Babylon. He only mentions Mark's having composed, 
from what he could recollect of Peter's lectures, that 
gospel which he wrote, as the Fathers tell us, in Egypt, 
at the universal request of those enthusiastic converts 
in Babylon, Jerusalem, Alexandria, and even Kome, and 
in all the other Christian cities who had, at different 
times, constituted Peter's crowded auditories in the East. 
What Baronius, and those who have followed him, sup- 
pose Papias to say, is, that Peter was in Europe while he 
was delivering those lectures from which Mark wrote. 
The words of this bishop are preserved by Eusebius, 
(iii. 39) and are as follows: " John, the Presbyter, also 
said that Mark, who was Peter's interpreter, gave from 
his recollection of what Peter used to tell, an accurate 
but not a systematic account of the sayings and doings 
of our Lord. For he neither heard nor followed our 
Lord; but subsequently, as I have said, accompanied 
Peter, who communicated the different facts to his 
hearers as occasion required ; not, however, just as one 
who was giving a consecutive history of our Lord's 
discourses. So that Mark's account is not the less cor- 
rect, from his having written some of the circumstances 
in the same order in which he remembered Peter to 
have told them. For he was careful not to omit or mis- 
state anything that he had heard from the apostle." To 
which words Eusebius adds : " This is what Papias says 
of Mark." Every one can see that in this statement 
there is nothing whatever about Peter's having aban- 
doned the Jews of the Dispersion. The modern Roman 
clergy who suppose, with some of the first adversaries of 
the Reformation, that Peter came into Europe, suppose 
also that Mark came with him, and (contrary to what the 
Fathers tell us) wrote his gospel while he was there with 
Peter. It is evident, however, that the words of Papias 
give no countenance to that story ; nay, that they clearly 
prove Peter not to have been with Mark when this 
Evangelist wrote his gospel, which fact will in a future 
page be found further corroborated by all the Fathers. 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 49 

Cardinal Bellarmine, and some other writers, have 
likewise, from their misconception of a passage in 
Eusebins (ii. 15), fallen into the mistaken notion that 
Papias said "Babylon" stood for "Rome" in Peter's 
First Epistle ; and that this being the case, it was most 
probable that Peter went to Europe instead of to 
Parthia when he left the Holy Land. But our task is 
here easy, for the Roman- catholic commentators on 
Eusebius admit that the name of Papias is not connected 
in this passage with the on-dit of the fourth century, 
about Babylon meaning Rome in Peter's First Epistle; 
and several Roman Catholics, of the highest celebrity in 
their church, frankly confess that the on-dit itself is 
unworthy of their church, too improbable, too late, nay, 
even too absurd and too unnatural, to be allowed for an 
instant to take the place of the plain account given to us 
in the Holy Scriptures on this subject. 

Henry de Yalois (a.d. 1676), commonly called by his 
Latin name, Yalesius, — the most celebrated Roman- 
catholic commentator on Eusebius, and whose authority 
as a Greek scholar all the clergy of his church accept, 
translates as follows the passage of Eusebius, referred 
to by Bellarmine: "This story (about Mark's gospel 
having been written at the request of all those who had 
been delighted with Peter's doctrines and eloquence in 
the East) is given by Clement of Alexandria, and cor- 
roborated by Papias. There is, moreover, a report that 
it is this Mark, the evangelist, that Peter mentions in 
his First Epistle; which it is also pretended (conten- 
dunt) was written at Rome, and that Peter intimates 
this himself by using the term c Babylon ' in a meta- 
phorical sense for Rome." (Euseb. ii. 15.) 

Yalesius remarks on the whole of the clause begin- 
ning, " There is, moreover," " Rufnnus understood this 
as if it was related by Papias ; and Musculus, in his 
translation adopted the same error. But these words 
are to be kept perfectly distinct (omnino sejunximus) 
from the preceding, and I find that this has been care- 
fully done even by St. Jerome and Nicephorus." 

E 



50 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

Father Dupin also, in his Preliminary Dissertation, 
(Notes on Sec. 4,) says of this interpretation of Peter's 
language : " Some have thought that Papias, and St. 
Clement of Alexandria, cited in this chapter by Eusebius, 
were of this opinion ; but it is not upon this point that 
Eusebius cites them." 

It is unnecessary to add anything more to prove 
that the Greek passage in Eusebius affords not the 
slightest pretext for supposing that Papias had ever 
heard of the rumour mentioned in it. Eusebius, with- 
out vouching for the truth of this rumour, merely men- 
tions it as the interpretation of some people in the fourth 
century, when he was writing, it being an opinion, then 
not uncommon among some of the Jews, that Babylon 
stood for Rome in the prophecies of Isaiah. But as this 
on-dit, and the grounds of it, will be fully examined 
when we are reviewing the testimonies of the fourth cen- 
tury, I shall here only observe that the Roman-catholic 
Archbishop Peter de Marca (a.d. 1662), whose learning 
and attachment to the Roman church were most conspi- 
cuous, is one of the many distinguished Roman-catholic 
writers, (of whom Father Calmet mentions several in his 
Preliminary Discourse, 1 Peter,) who refused to substi- 
tute a vague rumour of the fourth century for the plain 
language of the Holy Scriptures. u St. Peter went to 
Antioch," says Archbishop de Marca, " and from there 
to Babylon, where the hereditary patriarch of the first 
Dispersion of the Jews resided, When established in 
that city he wrote his First Epistle, as is clear from the 
words, 'the Church at Babylon salutes you.' " (De 
Marca, de Concordia, lib. vi. c. 1.) 

Father Dupin is another of these more accurate writers 
of the Roman church. " Peter's First Epistle," says he, 
in the Preliminary Dissertation, a was written from 
Babylon. Some were of opinion that Rome was meant 
by this name; but that interpretation is not natural 
(mais ce sens n'est pas naturel). We cannot precisely 
name the time when it was written, but we may say 
that it was written at Babylon, a.d. 45." 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 51 

Our present point, however, is not as to the abandon- 
ment of this on-dit by the more enlightened portion of the 
Koman clergy themselves, but as to whether we have any 
reason to think that Papias had ever heard of it, and after 
the foregoing analysis of this and the other point respect- 
ing what Papias says of Mark, let the conscientious Ro- 
man Catholic reflect upon the words of Father M c Corry, 
which, to do him justice, are but what he has read in 
Baronius and Bellarmine : " Papias tells us that Mark 
records in his Gospel what he had heard from St. Peter 
at Rome ; and he moreover tells us that St. Peter wrote 
his Epistle from Rome, calling that city by the mystic 
appellation of Babylon." 



VII. 

Heracleon (a.d. 126), of whose writings but very few 
words have come down to us, is adduced as evidence of 
the supposed event, merely because he had seen the work 
called " Peter's Proclamation f and yet did not contra- 
dict the statement that it is supposed to have contained 
upon this point. This reason for thinking that Peter 
had left Babylon is peculiar to Mr. Baratier, and is, 
therefore, one of those which the Correspondent in the 
Times puts forward as "thorough proof" and " demon- 
stration " of it. To say nothing of the absurdity of 
inferring from the few words of Heracleon' s that have 
come down to us, what was or what was not contradicted 
in his works, we have seen that as far as we know any- 
thing about it, " Peter's Proclamation " did not contain 
the alleged statement, and that therefore Heracleon had 
no occasion to have contradicted that document upon 
that point. What will the reader think of a cause that 
is supposed to derive assistance from such evidence as 
this? The following is another instance of what the 
Roman- catholic Correspondent in the Times so erro- 
neously supposes to be ■" thorough proof" and "de- 
monstration." 

e 2 



52 THE ANTENICENE KECOHDS. 



Y1II. 

" The Recognitions " is a work assigned by Mr. Baratier 
to the second century, though unquestionably belonging 
to the middle ages ; and is represented by him as stating 
that Peter went in person into Europe in pursuit of Simon 
Magus ; whereas it not only makes no such statement, but 
most distinctly records the contrary. In this work, which 
is a sort of historical romance, in no less than ten books, 
Peter, after a contest with the magician at Csesarea, and 
the latter's departure for Rome, is introduced (Book iii.) 
saying that he must follow him immediately to that city 
of the Gentiles (e vestigio insequi), in order to refute 
him at once, ( a ut continuo confutetur a nobis,") and 
that for this purpose, as Peter could not then personally 
leave Cassarea, he would despatch twelve ordained persons 
to Rome after him, in order that the magician might 
perceive that by them the apostle was always present 
with him (ut me in ipsis semper secum esse sentiat), at 
Rome or wherever else he went to ; and that he would 
himself proceed into Europe in three months afterwards. 
We are then told that the twelve missionaries were or- 
dained and sent to Rome, and that Peter, having re- 
mained three months at Csesarea, did not go to Rome, as 
he is made to say he would ; that on the contrary, he 
then went from Csesarea to Tripoli (Book iv.) ; and that, 
having remained at Tripoli for six months, he then went 
to Antioch (Book vi.), having Clemens Romanus with 
him the whole time, at which town the narrative con- 
cludes with events which occupy the four last books of 
the work, and without the slightest further allusion to 
any intention on Peter's part of going in any other sense 
to Rome. I do not insist upon the authority of the " Re- 
cognitions," for the facts here stated. The work has been 
approved of by Mr. Baratier and the Correspondent in 
the Times, as very clear proof upon the point at issue. I 
therefore refer to it to show how utterly mistaken they 
are, and that it not only does not say that Peter went to 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 53 

Eome in person, but that it says the exact contrary, viz., 
that he did not go there ; or, which is the same thing, 
that he only went there in the persons of his twelve 
evangelists or missionaries ; and that that was considered 
by the writer of the romance as equivalent in the middle 
ages to his having been there in person. 



IX. 

" The Clementina" is a work supposed by Baratier to 
have been originally written in the second century, but 
which he acknowledges to have undergone great changes 
in after times, and to be full of interpolations (admodum 
interpolatum et mutatum, p. 6). Yet he and the 
Roman-catholic Correspondent in the Times do not scruple 
to speak of it as some of the very best evidence that they 
could find of Peter's having been in Europe. It appears 
to me that their own account of this work, as given by 
the former and sanctioned by the latter, must annul 
its testimony in the eyes of all the more earnest of the 
Roman-catholic body. But I proceed to show, further, 
that all the more enlightened of the Roman clergy have 
always admitted that it is so full of these interpolations 
of the middle ages, so altered from what it originally 
was, and so replete with fictions and absurdities, that 
it cannot be regarded as affording any evidence upon 
this,' or upon any other subject. The only passage 
in it I may, however, first observe, that could possibly 
be mistaken to mean that Peter ever left the East, 
occurs in the part called " The Epitome of the Re- 
cognitions," and is evidently no more than an allusion 
to what was said in the " Recognitions" itself, about 
Peter's having followed the Samaritan impostor to 
Rome, in the persons of his twelve missionaries, as any 
one can perceive by comparing the two passages. The 
words are, — "But after Peter had in this manner 

arrived at Rome, and had there taught 

the worship of the true God against the Samaritan, and 
made many converts, he at length went to his 



54 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

heavenly home." Instead of enlarging upon the obvious 
sense of these words, I confine myself to showing 
that Baronius and Ceillier, in short, all the Roman- 
catholic writers, are unanimous in describing the •• Cle- 
mentina," in unmeasured terms, as a mere tissue of lies 
and nonsense, and as a work that none of the Fathers of 
the church would have considered as testimony that they 
could rely on, of Peter's having been in person in 
Europe, even if it had existed in their day, and contained 
a statement to that effect. 

Father Tillemont says of the "Clementina," — "We 
need not say much about this work — full as it is of fal- 
acies and fables." 

Father Dupin says, — " The last work attributed to 
St. Clement of Rome is a collection of divers pieces, 
entitled, 4 Clementina.' Perhaps this is the second part 
of the ' Recognitions,' for it is a continuation of what is 
called ' The Acts of St. Peter.' All these writings are 
only a series of fictions and idle stories." 

The Dominican Fathers in the " Bibliotheque Sacree" 
write thus : " The works falsely ascribed to St. Clement 
of Rome are, 1 . c The Apostolic Constitutions,' an ancient 
document into which various changes and additions have 
been introduced from age to age. 2. c The Recognitions,' 
an old apocryphal writing, full of faults and fictions. 
Also, 3. ' The Clementina,' which is perhaps the second 
part of the c Recognitions.' " 

Father Ceillier says, — " There is a work extant, under 
the name of St. Clement of Rome, containing nineteen 
conversations, which is commonly called the 4 Clemen- 
tina.' Cotelier thinks that they may be another edition 
of the 'Recognitions.' What is certain is, that we find 
several things (plusieurs traits) in it that we also read 
of in the 'Recognitions.' It has the same inventions 
and the same mis-statements, and the plan of the two 
works is the same. In every part of it, we find proofs 
that St. Clement of Rome had nothing to do with the 
writing of it." 

Cardinal Baronius frequently condemns this book, as 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 55 

incompetent to prove anything, and as unknown to the 
Fathers. He says that it " abounds in falsehoods," (Men- 
daciis confertus, a.d. 41, paragraph 10) ; is " full of 
stupid fictions," (insulsis fabulis refertus, a.d. 102, para- 
graph 22), "full of corruptions," (depravatus, cor- 
ruptus, paragraph 21), and that "anyone accustomed 
to read the Fathers must see that they never mention it 
or allude to it," (Temperasse quidem Patres ab eorundem 
librorum usu, nemo est qui antiquorum libris assuetus 
non intelligat. Ibid.) 

It is clear that when such a character attaches to a 
work, all inquiry as to what it states is superseded ; and 
we have here, as I have said, another opportunity of 
seeing the kind of testimony which Mr. Baratier con- 
sidered himself obliged to have recourse to, and which 
the Correspondent in the Times calls " thorough proof" of 
Peter's having left the East. 



" The Apostolic Constitutions" is another work whose 
testimony is adduced by Baratier in favour of the sup- 
position that Peter must have left the East, although 
no Roman-catholic writer (except that singularly enthu- 
siastic one, the Correspondent in the Times) pretends 
that it can be considered as affording any evidence what- 
ever on the subject. The passage selected by Baratier 
as the strongest is that in which he states that Clement, 
who was a native of Rome, converted by Barnabas, and 
ordained by Peter, after a long residence with this latter 
apostle in the East, was the second bishop of the Roman 
church ; as if Clement could not have been sent by Peter 
from Asia to be bishop of Rome, but that Peter must 
himself have gone over with him to instal him ! a sup- 
position so contrary to all usage, modern and ancient, 
that it would seem childish to discuss it. The Roman 
Catholics tell us, that Mark was ordained and sent to 
Alexandria by Peter to be bishop of the church there ; 
but no Roman Catholic has ever pretended that Peter 



56 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

went there with him to instal him. The passage in u The 
Constitutions" is as follows : — " Now concerning those 
bishops who have been ordained in our lifetime, we make 
known to you that they are these :..... of Antioch, 
Evodius, ordained by me, Peter, and Ignatius by Paul. 
.... Of the church of Rome, Linus, the son of Claudia, 
was the first, ordained by Paul; and Clement, after 

Linus's death, the second, ordained by me, Peter 

These are the bishops who are intrusted by us with the 
parishes in the Lord," &c. 



XL 

Dionysius Corinthus, (about a.d. 170,) a bishop of 
Corinth, is relied upon as the clearest possible proof that 
Peter's martyrdom took place in Europe, and not, as is 
intimated in the Scriptures, at Babylon. He does not, 
however, say anything of the kind. He only says that 
it occurred about the same time as Paul's martyrdom, 
which we know from other sources took place at Rome. 
Lie also adverts to the principle laid down by Paul, 
(1 Cor, iii. 8,) that he who watered a planted church, 
was as much a planter of that church as he who origin- 
ally planted it ; and reminds the Romans that, although 
no Corinthians are mentioned in the Acts (chap, ii.) 
as being with them among the first Christian -converts 
made by Peter at Jerusalem, and although, therefore, 
strictly speaking, Paul was, as he himself says, ( 1 Cor. 
iii. 6 — 10, also iv. 15), the original planter of the Corin- 
thian church, yet as there were subsequently Corinthian 
converts with St. Peter at Jerusalem, through whom 
this apostle's instructions were conveyed to Corinth, the 
church of Corinth was therefore to be considered as 
having been planted by our Lord's twelve apostles while 
they were at Jerusalem, as well as the church of liome 
was, — a community of origin which Dionysius assigns 
as a reason for good-fellowship between the Roman and 
Corinthian Christians. The following is the extract 
cited from this bishop's letter to the Romans; it lias 
been preserved by Eusebius (ii. 25) : — u By your recent 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 57 

exhortation, ye blend, as it were, the plant of the 
Komans and Corinthians, which was propagated by 
Peter and Paul; for it was not until after both these 
apostles had planted us in this Corinth of ours, as well 
as in Italy, by addressing their instructions, both of 
them, to the same cities (o^octe SiSaSayrec) that they were 
put to death for the faith, as they were about the same 
time." Some of the translators introduce here words 
equivalent to "went," or "came;" which gave rise to 
the impression that Dionysius supposed Peter to have 
gone to Corinth and to Rome with Paul to plant Chris- 
tianity there, but no such word of any kind is to be 
found in the original, nor have we the slightest trace 
any where of Peter's having gone to Corinth. Father 
M c Corry appears, as the reader will observe, to have 
been singularly deceived about this Greek passage. 



XII. 

Hegesippus (a.d. 180) says not one word about Peter's 
having left the East, nor do any of the learned pretend 
to say he does. On this point Baronius. Bellarmine, 
Pearson, and Baratier, are all agreed. The only ex- 
tracts that have been preserved from his writings may 
be seen in Eusebius, and in them he does not even men- 
tion Peter's name. When Father M c Corry and the Cor- 
respondent in the Times adduce this author as evidence 
of Peter's being in Italy, it is because they suppose him 
to be the author of the little work of the middle ages, 
on the Destruction of Jerusalem, in which there are 
some extracts from Jacques de Voragine's story about 
the Learned Dogs and the Fiery Chariot at Rome, and 
which work was sometimes inscribed with the name of 
Hegesippus, by corruption for Josephus, from whose 
writings part of it was compiled. It is unnecessary 
to enter into much proof that this little romance was 
not written by Hegesippus. All well-informed writers 
without exception, Roman-catholic as well as Pro- 
testant, acknowledge that it was not. From its con- 



58 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

tents it is admitted to have been composed at least after 
the tenth century. But the portions about Peter and 
the Golden Legend are manifestly copied from the 
Pseudo-Abdias, a work commonly assigned to the four- 
teenth or fifteenth. The following Roman-catholic au- 
thorities will suffice : 

The Benedictine Fathers, in the Bibliotheque Sacree, 
say : " We have a History of the Destruction of Jerusa- 
lem in five books, under the name of this ancient Hege- 
sippus, the author of which lived at least two hundred 
years after him. It appears to be only a work compiled 
from Josephus, the Jewish historian, whose name was 
corrupted into that of Hegesippus." 

Father Dupin says : u We have besides, under the 
name of Hegesippus, a history of the taking of Jerusalem, 
divided into five books. But it is certain that this work 
does not belong to Hegesippus, it being evident that it 
was written by some one who lived after the reign of 
Constantine the Great. . . . Others, as Yossius and Mi- 
raeus, affirm that this book was compiled after the tenth 
century. Be that as it may, whoever wrote this book is 
only a transcriber or translator of Josephus, who made a 
kind of imperfect epitome of his history, giving it the 
title of Joseppi or Josippi, and the copyists, not under- 
standing this word, substituted Igisippi or Egesippi in 
its stead, as appears from some of the MSS." 

Father Ceillier says : "As to the five books on the 
destruction of Jerusalem, which pass under the name of 
Hegesippus, it is agreed on all hands now-a-days,that they 
were written by some one of a much more recentage." 

Father Tillemont (49th note on Peter) observes: "I 
have not ventured to quote what is said of St. Peter in 
the History of the Jews that passes under the name of 
Hegesippus. We do not know who that writer was, 
nor in what time he lived." 

It is then evident that Hegesippus afibrds no evidence 
upon this subject ; and as to the story about the Learned 
Dogs and the Fiery Chariot, extracts of which are con- 
tained in the work of the middle ages that used to bear 
Vr nmne. Father M c Corry and the Correspondent in the 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 59 

Times are the only modern members of their church 
that depend upon it for proof of Peter's not having 
remained at Babylon. I do not mention here what this 
story is, as it will be found at full length in the last 
chapter of this work. 



XIII. 

Victor (about a.d. 200), a bishop of Rome, is supposed 
by Baratier to have written two letters on Easter, which 
no other w T riter attributes to him, in which letters the 
usual form of expressing the authenticity of the Roman 
doctrine occurs : " This was the doctrine taught at Rome 
by Peter." "It is manifest, therefore," says Baratier, 
"that Peter was at Rome." I appeal to any impartial 
reader, at all acquainted with the ecclesiastical phraseo- 
logy of those times, whether this might not mean quite as 
well u the doctrine which Peter caused to be taught at 
Rome," as that "which he himself personally taught 
there," and whether the expression in question might not 
have been used if Peter had never left Jerusalem. Sal- 
vianus and St. Augustine, African writers, fathers of 
the church, use the same expression respecting Peter's 
having taught at Carthage, where no writer pretended 
that Peter or any one of the apostles ever was. How 
then can it be so manifest from such words that 
Peter was at Rome? But this is not the only remark 
to be here made. No other writer except Baratier — 
neither Baronius, nor Ceillier, nor Bellarmine, nor 
any other, either among Roman-catholics or Protest- 
ants, speaks of these supposed letters of Victor's as 
anything but the clumsiest forgeries, and as the pro- 
duction of some much later writer. Baratier only 
says that he sees no very good reason why they should 
be so ! " It is evident," says he, "that Victor wrote letters 
upon this subject (of Easter). Why may not some of 
them be extant? and if any are extant, why may not 
these be they, since there is nothing in them but what 
may have been Victor's?" This the Correspondent in the 
Times must concede is not what is commonly meant by 



60 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

" demonstration." For the sake of brevity in a case so 
very evident, I only cite Salvianus and Baronius on the 
expression, and Father Ceillier on the letters. 

Salvianus (a.d. 400) says: "Carthage — which our 
Lord's apostles formerly instructed in their doctrines. " 
(Quam quondam doctrinis suis Apostoli instituerant. 
De Gubernatione Dei, lib. vii.) 

Baronius remarks : " Augustine and Salvianus fre- 
quently say that the African churches had received the 
Gospel from our Lord's apostles." (a.d. 44, para- 
graph 38.) 

Ceillier says on Victor : " There are four letters still 
extant in these days that pass under his name, two of 
which are among the false decretals. The other two are 
also forgeries. The writer does not even seem to know 
what occurred in Victor's time about Easter, which is 
the subject of the letters." (Vol. ii.) 



XIV. 

Iren^us (a.d. 200), bishop of Lyons, in France, is sup- 
posed to afford more decisive proof than any other ancient 
writer, that Peter must have left the East and come into 
Europe. To those, therefore, who attend minutely to it, 
it will, for that very reason, afford the stronger proof of 
the contrary ; for they will see that what is most de- 
pended upon as proof of the Papal story is, in reality, 
to be as little depended upon as what is put forward with 
diffidence and uncertainty. 

Irenseus says that Peter had a share with Paul in 
making the first converts, in engaging the first teachers, 
and in promoting the extension of the Koman church ; 
or, as this writer expresses himself, in " founding," and 
in " edifying " it. This, say some Poman-catholic 
writers, he could not have done, without having gone 
himself into Europe. Of Irengeus's three passages to 
the same effect, the strongest is that cited by the 
Correspondent in the Times, and is the one usually 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 61 

cited on this occasion : " The greatest and most ancient 
church founded and built by the two glorious apostles, 
Paul and Peter." (iii. 3.) Another of these passages is 
as follows : " Matthew published his Gospel among the 
Hebrews in their own language, while Peter and Paul 
were engaged in evangelizing and founding the Christian 
church at Rome. And after their death (some translate 
it their final departure from Juclasa, when all the apostles 
separated), Mark, also the disciple and interpreter of 
Peter, gave us in writing what Peter made the peculiar 
subject of his proclamations to the Dispersion." (iii. 1.) 
The third passage from this writer is thus : " The blessed 
apostles having founded and edified (or built) that 
church (of Rome), gave the ministration of its episcopal 
duties to Linus. This is the Linus whom Paul mentions 
in his Epistles to Timothy." (iii. 3.) 

That Peter was one of those who laid the foundations 
of Christ's church at Rome, as Irenseus here states, there 
neither is nor ever was any doubt. There is not, however, 
in this fact the slightest pretext for supposing that he or 
any of the rest of the apostles (and they all co-operated 
with him) came into Europe to lay these foundations. A 
short and complete proof of this is that Cardinal Baronius, 
whose authority upon that point no Roman Catholic will 
refuse, acknowledges that there is not, and that the 
apostle's presence in a city was not at all necessary to 
enable him to found, plant, erect, or evangelize a church 
there. The Cardinal's own unambiguous words will be 
found a few pages farther on; but (as in the former case 
about Peter's martyrdom), I shall here first place before 
the reader the scriptural account of this transaction as it 
was understood by the fathers, and by Baronius also ; from 
which it will be seen that Peter was not in Europe, nor 
even supposed to be in Europe, when he was laying the 
foundations of the Roman church ; that the thing was 
done at Jerusalem, and that all our Lord's apostles, as 
well as Peter, assisted and co-operated; that it took 
place, at least, that it commenced, immediately after 
the Ascension, immediately after those memorable words, 



62 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

a Go, teach all nations " — that it took place, in short, 
when Peter, standing up with the eleven at Jerusalem, 
pronounced that energetic appeal whereby, we are told, 
that simultaneously all the most ancient churches of the 
earth were founded. 

From the second chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, 
we learn that a body of Roman Jews (some of them Jews 
by birth, others by conversion) who were making a tem- 
porary stay at Jerusalem at that time (v. 10 and 14), 
were converted to Christianity by Peter's exhortations 
(v. 37), and baptized at Jerusalem into the church of 
Christ (v. 41), thus receiving, as Peter had promised 
them (v. 38), " the gift of the Holy Ghost ;"— that these 
Romans, as long as they remained at Jerusalem, near 
the apostles, continued steadfastly in the apostles' doc- 
trine and fellowship, and in the breaking of bread and in 
prayers" (v. 42); and that not long afterwards, in the 
same year, a persecution breaking out at Jerusalem 
about Stephen (viii. 1; and xi. 19), these Roman con- 
verts, with " the gift of the Holy Ghost" fresh upon 
them, went back, a Christian church, to their native city, 
" preaching the word" (viii. 4). 

It is true that the Roman Jews must have been but a 
small portion of Peter's auditors upon this and the two 
or three subsequent occasions of his addressing them, 
prior to the general dispersion of the Christians from 
Jerusalem ; but it is not improbable that they amounted 
to at least 100, for Baronius calculates, as will be seen 
presently, that all the Jewish converts who left Jerusalem 
upon that persecution to return to their different homes 
throughout the world, must have been upwards of 
15,000. But even if the Roman converts did not 
amount to 100, as the proportion of Jews at Rome was 
very small, there being but 8000 at Rome (Josephus 
Ant. xvii. 11), while there were a million at Alexan- 
dria alone (Philo. de Virt.), and several millions in 
Babylon and its vicinity (Josephus and Philo. ibid.), 
yet it cannot be said that even fifty Roman Christians 
returning from Judaea and preaching the word, could 
hardly be what Irenaeus meant to speak of as "a church." 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 63 

The early Fathers considered that a Christian church 
did not at all depend on numbers. u One or two per- 
sons," says Tertullian, a constitute a church." (In 
uno et altero Ecclesia est. De Penitentia, c. x. ) And in 
another place: " Three persons, even if they are not 
ordained, constitute a church." (Ubi tres ecclesia est, 
licet laici. De Castit.) The apostles themselves, also, 
often speak of a single Christian household, or of the 
Christian congregation assembling at one person's house, 
as an apostolic church, (Rom. xvi. 3 and 5; Col. iv. 15; 
Phil. i. 2), and our Lord had taught them to do so, 
when He said, " Where two or three are gathered 
together, there am I in the midst of them." But we 
have no reason to suppose that the Roman church 
at its first foundation had much less than at least 100 
members, if it had not a great, many more; two of 
whom Paul mentions in his Epistle to that church, at 
a much later period: " Salute Andronicus and Junia, 
my kinsmen and my fellow-prisoners, who are of note 
among the apostles, who also were in Christ before 

ME." 

Such, then, is the Scripture history of the Christian 
church founded at Rome by Peter (as the fathers 
understood it to be founded by him), almost immediately 
after our Lord's ascension, while Pilate was still governor 
of Judaea, Tiberius still emperor, and upwards of a year 
before the conversion of St. Paul, — a period long ante- 
cedent to that at which the Roman clergy suppose that 
any of our Lord's apostles could have come into Europe. 
We see also from the Scripture History of this trans- 
action, that the foundations of the Roman church were 
laid, not by Peter only of the twelve, as some have 
weakly imagined, but by Peter and his eleven col- 
leagues,^ — a most important fact in connexion with this 
subject, which obtains too little attention from the ge- 
neral reader. In this passage of Irenasus, as so often else- 
where, we find Peter's name set down alone to represent 
all the twelve apostles of the circumcision. No Roman- 
catholic supposes, or is taught by his clergy to suppose, 
tint it was not on behalf of his colleagues as well as on 



64 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

his own behalf, that Peter delivered his address on the 
occasion I advert to. "He pronounced that discourse," 
says Father Tillemont, " in the name of the other 
apostles, who all spoke by his mouth, and who authorized 
him by their presence. For they could not all speak at 
once " — a remark in which this learned priest was pre- 
ceded by St. Chrysostom. " They allowed Peter to speak 
for them," says St. Chrysostom, in his Fourth Homily on 
the Acts of the Apostles, " for they could not all speak 
together." We must not lose sight of this. 

Nor do the scriptures warrant the supposition that it 
was only as its founders that the apostles, with Peter for 
their representative and deputy, were at this time related 
to the church at Rome ; and that after they had once 
laid its first foundations, they neither added to these, nor 
did anything else while they continued at Jerusalem, to 
edify and advance it — a strange notion, entertained, how- 
ever, by some of the Roman-catholics. On the contrary, 
there can be no doubt, from what St. Luke tells us in 
the Acts, that, as long as the apostles remained together 
there, they occupied themselves in not only strengthen- 
ing the foundations of the Roman Church, by their inter- 
course with the Roman converts already made, but that 
they also contributed to its extension and "edification, "by 
sending over, from time to time, fresh supplies of converts 
from the Roman Jews — either from those of them who, 
Philo informs us (De Virtut. p. 1014), repaired to Jeru- 
salem with the proceeds of the First Fruit Offerings every 
year, or from such other Roman Jews as for any other 
purpose visited that city, in which, for their accommoda- 
tion, there was a Roman synagogue with a school attached 
to it. There can, I say, be no doubt that in this way 
the apostles added to that church daily ; and that, not 
converts only, but persons whom they deputed to preach 
for them on their return, and to baptize for them at 
Rome. And this daily care of the apostles for the 
churches continued about twelve years. Their departure 
(or Exodus) out of Juclasa is not mentioned by Baro- 
nius as having taken place much before that time ; and 



THE ANTENICENE EECORDS. 65 

Jerusalem, the great centre of the Jewish world, afforded 
such advantages for the proclamation of the Gospel in 
every city, as could not have been expected to attend 
the personal presence of the apostles anywhere else. 
Whence it will be seen that Paul was converted soon 
enough to have a share in the earlier converts of 
the church of Rome, as is stated in this passage of 
Irenaeus, for his conversion took place, as all the Roman 
clergy are agreed, less than two years after our Lord left 
his apostles. (Baronius and Calmet place it a.d. 34.) 
And as to Paul's part in the edification or extension of 
that church, we know from the Scriptures that he wrote 
letters to it, and that he even resided at Rome for two 
whole years, preaching there ; besides which, it is clear 
that he co-operated with the twelve in their exertions at 
Jerusalem on its behalf, until Peter went to Babylon and 
the rest elsewhere, after which period Paul seems to have 
been unaided by the apostles of the circumcision, in his 
continued efforts to extend and edify the church of Rome. 
I have confined these scriptural statements to this 
church of Rome ; but as we learn from the same pas- 
sages of the Acts, this was not the only church founded 
by the apostles at Jerusalem, immediately after the 
ascension. Far from it. The churches of Babylon and 
Pontus, of Carthage and Gyrene, of Colosse and Alexan- 
dria, of Antioch and Cyprus, with innumerable others, 
began all then their bright career. In fact, in every 
place where there was a synagogue, by those few words 
of Peter, a Christian church was founded; for Jrom al- 
most every synagogue in the world there seems to have 
been at that time a deputation at Jerusalem, which was 
sent back by Peter gifted with the Holy Ghost and 
preaching the word. It is to this simultaneousness in 
the foundation of the churches that Peter himself alludes 
when he speaks of the churches of the provincial Disper- 
sion as having been founded at the same time as that of 
Babylon, the capital — (1 Pet. i. 1 ; v. 13) — a peculiarity 
in the foundation of all the earliest churches, which 
renders it, if possible, still more absurd to suppose that 

F 



6Q THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

Peter founded them by being himself personally present 
in the different cities. 

And it is in this scriptural sense that all the Fathers, 
Latin as well as Greek, understood the Koman church 
to have been founded. Gregory, the bishop of Nyssa, in 
Cappadocia (about a.d. 390), thus mentions the first 
Roman Christians, in his Sermon upon Stephen : " From 
this time the disciples of the twelve began to traverse 
the whole world, and this was the beginning of the dif- 
fusion of the Gospel in all quarters. For if the Jews 
had not thus persecuted the first Christians after Ste- 
phen's murder, perhaps the blessings of the Gospel 

MIGHT HAVE BEEN CONFINED TO JERUSALEM. But now 

that the Jews persecuted them, these first Christians 
were dispersed over the whole world, most of them going 
to different countries, expelling the father of evil by the 
doctrines of Christ. In this way it was that Samaria 
received the word. . . . Thus, also, the Egyptians, Sy- 
rians, Parthians, (in whose territory Babylon then was,) 
and the Mesopotamians, the Italians also, and the 
Illyrians and the Macedonians began to have their 
churches (Christum agnoscunt), and the Gospel travers- 
ing all nations, brought all the nations into the fold." 

Irenaeus, whose words we are now considering, says 
the same thing (b. iii. chap, xii.) After quoting portions 
of Peter's addresses, from the second and subsequent 
chapters of the Acts, he goes on thus : " These are the 
words of that church at Jerusalem, by which every 
other church was founded (or, from which every 
other church derived its foundation). These are the 
words of the Parent Church — of those who are the deni- 
zens of the New Testament — the words of the apostles 
— the words of the disciples of our Lord — of those who 
indeed were perfect disciples, made perfect by the Spirit 
after the ascension of the Lord." 

St. Jerome, also, in his commentary upon the second 
chapter of Haggai, after mentioning the earthquake that 
occurred at our Lord's crucifixion, says : " And by this 
concussion every nation of the earth was shaken. Be- 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 67 

cause then the voice of our Lord's apostles went forth 
— went forth and found its way into the remotest regions 
of the world. But why were the nations shaken ? That 
they might yield all the elect and whatever is to be found 
foremost in the faith. The elect of Corinth, for instance, 
for in Corinth God had many of his people. The elect 
of Macedonia, for there was a large church assembled in 
Thessalonica. The elect of Ephesus, that they should 
know the mysteries of God. What more need I add? 
All the nations were convulsed — all to whom the Saviour 
sent his apostles when he said, ' Go, teach all nations ' — 
all were shaken, and the few that were chosen out of the 
many that were called, constructed the churches of the 
first Christians. Hence the apostle Peter says ' The 
church at Babylon, that is elect, salutes you.' Hence 
the apostle John writes to 4 The lady that is elect,' and 
afterwards mentions c the children of her elect sister.' In 
this way the nations were convulsed — unable to withstand 
the brightness of the word, and the elect of all the nations 
were put forward. It was then that was complete the 
glory of the Lord's House, which is the church of the 
living God." 

Baronius quotes others of the fathers to the same 
effect. " You have it stated," says St. Athanasius, the 
patriarch of Alexandria, in his sermon De Sementi — 
" you have it stated in the Acts of the Apostles, after 
the stoning of Stephen, that the disciples of the twelve 
were scattered, and as it were sown over the earth ; not 
that these primitive Christians were thus dispersed 
through pusillanimity, but in the interests of the 
faith. For they were scattered in this way in order that 
in their travels over the whole world they might diifuse, 
and as it were sow the Christian churches, the powers 
and excellencies that are in the doctrine of life." 

The Cardinal also quotes the following words from St. 
Chrysostom's Homilies upon the Acts of the Apostles : 
" Peter pleaded the cause of Christ upon behalf of our 
Lord's other eleven apostles, as well as upon his own. . . 
He was the first who collected a church, and that not of 

f 2 



68 THE ANTENICENE EECORDS. 

the Jews only who belonged to Jerusalem and to the 
country round, but of the Jews of Parthia (in whose 
country Babylon was in the apostolic times), and of the 
Medes, and of the Phrygians, of the Africans (near Carth- 
age), of the Egyptians (i.e. Alexandrians), and of the 
Arabs, of the Romans, and of others. He who was ex- 
pressly appointed by our Lord as the shepherd of the lost 
sheep, began then to collect these scattered flocks out of 
all nations. He also taught them to renounce all things, 
and to meet together for the breaking of bread and for 
prayers." 

St. Chrysostom again, also, makes the following allu- 
sion to this sudden creation of the Christian churches 
everywhere : — " For though it is a little thing to say 
" I shall build my church," do not hasten over the words 
as if they were nothing, but unfold them to your under- 
standing, and reflect how immense an act it was in this 
rapid manner to fill with so many churches every por- 
tion of the earth that is inhabited by mankind, and to 
erect altars everywhere, — in the country of the Romans 
and of the Persians (within which, in Chrysostom's day, 
stood Babylon), in Scythia, in Mauritania (where Car- 
thage was), and upon the Indus. But what am I saying ? 
This fact went even beyond this world of ours. For 
the British Isles, which are situated beyond our sea — 
which lie, in fact, in the very ocean — these felt the 
power of those mighty words ; for even there — even in 
those islands, churches and altars were then erected, 
and the words so spoken were realized in every heart. 
Thus it was that His apostles built our Lord's churches 
everywhere." — (Chrysos. vol. i. pp. 701 and 702.) 

Instead of illustrating any further the undisputed 
unanimity of the fathers upon this point, I give Baro- 
nius's own account of this foundation, or first creation 
of the Christian churches : " In the 35th year," says he, 
" after the birth of Christ, all the Christians except the 
apostles were compelled to leave Jerusalem on Stephen's 
death, when they proceeded into different countries, 
the most widely separated from one another. In these 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 69 

countries they preached the gospel, and enabled the 

APOSTLES IN THIS MANNER TO MULTIPLY UNDER FAVOUR- 
ABLE CIRCUMSTANCES THE CHURCHES OF GOD. For it 

was not only into Judsea and Samaria, as Luke mentions 
chap, viii., that these first Christians travelled. He also 
tells us most distinctly that they passed the frontiers of 
Palestine and went into other countries (see Acts xi. 19). 
We find that an immense number of these first Jewish 
converts went into Asia, to whom Peter afterwards 
wrote his Epistles, inscribed to those scattered through- 
out Pontus, Galatia and Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia. 
.... For the Jews lived far and wide, in Asia and 
Africa, and even Europe, as well as within the limits of 
the Holy Land; and that the number of these first 
Christians was very great, is evident; for if any one 
will only calculate them and reflect that none but the 
apostles remained at Jerusalem, he will find that several 
thousand Christians must have been scattered over the 
world upon that occasion." And again, after specifying 
the result of Peter's addresses as indicated in the 2nd, 
4th, 5th, and 6th chapters of the Acts, he sums up thus : 
" If, therefore, we reckon all these, we shall not be very 
wrong if we suppose 15,000 men to have been then dis- 
persed; so that we cannot wonder to find from Peter 
and others, that they had passed into the most distant 
and different lands." (Annals, a.d. 35, paragraphs, 1, 
2, and 3.) 

But enough has been said to show that in the Scrip- 
tural account of the foundation of the church of Rome, 
as understood by the Roman Catholics as well as by all 
the Fathers, there is not the slightest pretext for sup- 
posing that Peter left the East to effect it. It remains 
to show that even the Roman clergy admit that his 
personal presence was not necessary for such a purpose. 
And happily one brief testimony settles this. Baronius 
himself, even in the case of Antioch, in which there was 
no motive for a strained opinion (as the apostles were 
often there), admits that Peter's presence was not essen- 
tial to the foundation of his churches. " For what does 



70 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

it mean," says Baronius (a.d. 39, paragraph 16), "when 
Peter is said to have founded the church of Antioch ? 
They are quite wrong who think that Peter must have 
gone to Antioch for that purpose." (Errant mea sen- 
tentia qui existimarent, ad hoc, opus fuisse ut Petrus 
petierit Antiochiam.) Again: " As Peter's chair at 
Alexandria, in wdiich it cannot be made to appear that 
Peter ever was, was founded by that apostle, it is quite 
evident that his presence was not necessary to found 
even a patriarchal see." (Non prsesentiam Petri, sed 
potissimurn requisitam esse auctoritatem ad constitu- 
endam sedem aliquam Patriarchalem. ) Again: "When, 
therefore, we say that Peter founded the See (or Chair) 
of Antioch, this must not be supposed to imply that 
Peter was among any of the first who preached there, 
for that, it is quite evident, was done exclusively by 
those Christians who, on Stephen's death, were driven 
from Jerusalem." He further admits that these first 
Christians founded the churches wherever they went. 
" If others preached at Antioch before Peter, and were 
thus considered to have founded that church, (a quibus 
j actum videretur ecclesise fundamentum, ) Peter and 
Paul cannot in that sense be said to be its founders," (hac 
exparte fundatores. ) And again : u But if on the other 
hand, Peter is to be considered to have founded the 
church of Antioch, notwithstanding that it was not he 
who introduced the gospel there, Paul is certainly en- 
titled to being considered in this light quite as much as 
Peter ; for Paul did quite as much as Peter to promote 
that object. So that St. Ignatius, writing to the 
Magnesians, says that Paul had as much to do with 
the foundation of the church at Antioch as Peter had, 
and that the church of Antioch was founded by both 
of them," (ab utroque esse fundatam ecclesiam An- 
tioch enam. ) 

The reader sees, also, in these passages that the See 
(or Chair) of Alexandria, was also considered to have 
been founded by St. Peter, although it is admitted by all 
parties that the apostle never was in that city. Nor is 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 71 

this view of the origin of that See peculiar to Baronius. 
We find that this was the general doctrine of the popes. 
They considered that it was for this purpose St. Peter 
sent Mark to Alexandria. Father Tillemont, speaking 
of the popes in his thirty-first note on Peter, says : " They 
hold that St. Peter founded the See of Alexandria; and 
that he did so through the instrumentality of Mark." 
This learned priest also adverts, in his twenty-fifth note 
on Peter, to what Baronius here says of Antioch: 
" Cardinal Baronius considered that Peter was able to 
found his Chair of Antioch, and to establish his See in 
that city without going there," (sans y aller.) In addi- 
tion to which I may observe that a large majority of the 
Roman clergy are, by their peculiar view of Peter's 
history at this period, reduced to the necessity of ad- 
mitting that Peter's foundation of the church of Rome 
took place while he was in the East. It will be seen 
in Part II. Section II. of the present Treatise, that 
Father Ceillier, Stephen Baluze, Father Pagi, Father 
Calmet, and a large majority of the writers in com- 
munion with the church of Rome, were of opinion that 
Peter could not have left the East for at least twenty 
years after our Lord's ascension; yet none of these 
writers considered that the capital of the empire was 
without its church during all that time, or that Paul's 
letter to the Roman church was not written for upwards 
of twenty years after the ascension. These writers, there- 
fore, have no alternative. They frankly admit that Peter's 
foundation of their church took place while he was in the 
East. But the authority of Irenseus himself on this point 
obviates the necessity of adducing any other. Irenseus 
knew that the church of Rome was founded without the 
personal presence of St. Paul ; for St. Paul, in his letter 
to it, speaks of it as a flourishing church, and alludes at 
the same time to his not having yet been able to go to 
Rome ; still Irenseus, nevertheless, says in the very pas- 
sage we are considering, that Paul was one of those who 
laid the foundations of the church at Rome. Here is the 
clearest and concisest evidence imaginable that this Father 



72 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

did not mean to imply Peter's absence from the East in 
Peter's foundation of the church at Rome. Again: 
Irena3us says, in this same passage, that the Roman 
church was one of the first founded — one of the earliest 
and most ancient churches. But the Roman clergy tell 
us, as may be seen in the quotations just given from 
Baronius, that the church of Antioch and all the most 
ancient churches were founded within a year after the 
Ascension. Does not Iren£eus then plainly state, upon 
this showing of the Roman clergy themselves, that Rome 
also had its church from the apostles, during that first 
year, and therefore that it was founded by them without 
their presence at Rome? Is ifc not doing violence to his 
words to suppose them consistent with the supposition 
that Rome was at least a dozen years later than the ear- 
liest and most ancient of the churches in his time ? And 
again : Irenseus says that Matthew's Gospel was written 
at the time this church was being founded, and the Ro- 
man clergy consider that it was written in, or even much 
before the year a.d. 41, four years, at least, before any 
of them think that Peter left the East. Baronius, with 
whom Calmet and Ceillier agree, says in his Annals, at 
the year a.d. 41 (paragraph 15), " In this same year 
Matthew wrote his Gospel." And immediately after- 
wards, speaking of Peter's supposed journey from the 
East, he says : " And this took place in the second year 
of Claudius, a.d. 45, four years after the publication of 
Matthew's Gospel." Father Tillemontand others of the 
Roman clergy, as well as the Protestant writers, assign 
a much earlier date to this gospel. " It seems necessary 
to mention here," says Father Tillemont, " that Matthew 
wrote only three years after our Lord's death." He then 
combats the opinion of Baronius, and says, in his fifth 
note on Matthew, that even a.d. 39 is too late a date to 
assign to the first appearance of this gospel. Home, in 
his Introduction, says : " Tiberius died in the spring of 
a.d. 37, and it is highly probable that Matthew's gospel 
was written by that time." Thus Baronius has the latest 
date, but even with that date we see that Irenasus knew 
Peter was at Jerusalem when he says that this apostle 
was founding the church that was at Rome. 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 73 

The Greek term " evangelizing," found in one of 
Irenasus's passages, denotes, as may be seen in the 
lexicons, to instruct a church by written documents, as 
well as orally, and was ultimately almost exclusively 
applied to written instructions. The Roman-catholic, 
as well as Protestant critics, indicate another sense of 
this expression. " In the beginning of Christianity," 
says Father Calmet, in his Dictionary, " there were 
evangelists and preachers who, without being iixed to 
any church, preached wherever they were led by the 
Holy Spirit." " We learn from Eusebius (v. 9,) and 
other writers cited by Suicer," says Dr. Bloomiield, to 
the same effect, in his New Testament, " that in the 
Apostolic Church, ' evangelists ' was the appellation 
given to those preachers who aided the labours of the 
apostles, not by taking charge of any particular church, 
but by acting as itinerant preachers and teachers where- 
ever their labours might be needed, and thus building 
on a foundation previously laid by the apostles." 

At the risk of seeming tedious on a point so evident, 
I shall here observe that we hear much of this church in 
the history of Tiberius, as he happened to have a sort 
of controversy with the Senate respecting its encourage- 
ment. It appears that in consequence of despatches 
received from Pilate, Tiberius, apparently from pure 
good will to the Roman church, proposed to the Senate 
that our Lord should be worshipped among the gods of 
Rome. The Senate sought to flatter Tiberius by ob- 
jecting to this proposal, upon the ground that he had 
previously considered himself undeserving of that ho- 
nour. Some say, and with an appearance of truth, that 
the secret cause of their objecting was the emperor's 
having proposed a measure which it was their own ex- 
clusive prerogative to propose. Be that as it may, 
Tiberius did not persist in his proposal ; but contented 
himself with neutralizing a law that the Senate had 
passed for the expulsion of the Christian church from 
Rome. This he effected by issuing an imperial edict, 
with very heavy penalties annexed, that there should be 
no more informations lodged against the members of 



74 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

that church. This account will be found given at length 
in Tertullian (Apol. v.), Eusebius (ii. 2), and many 
other writers. It is also admitted by the Roman clergy 
to be true, 

Orosius, the historian, in relating this, says : " The 
Senate not only refused this apotheosis of the Saviour, 
but passed a law for the expulsion of the Christian 
church from Rome (edicto constituit exterminandos esse 
Urbe Christianos. ) Tiberius, however, by a counter- 
mandate, threatened death to those who should lay the 
necessary accusations against the members of this com- 
munity." (Lib. vii. c. 4.) 

Father Calmet says, in his Dictionary : " Tiberius 
continued to show his good inclinations towards the 
Christians, and even threatened those with death who 
gave them any disturbance. In short, we do not find 
any persecution of the church under this emperor." 

The foregoing illustrations show not only that Peter 
was in the East, and was considered by the fathers to be 
in the East whenever they speak of his founding the 
church at Rome, but they also show us the unreason- 
ableness of inferring that Peter was present in any 
country or city merely from his ecclesiastical relations 
to its church being mentioned. When we hear of his 
having his chair anywhere — of the chair there being 
founded upon him — of his having sat in it — of his 
having died in it — of a city being Peter's see — of his 
instructing the church there — of his having many 
hearers in that city — of his proclaiming the gospel in it 
— of his ordaining one of its bishops — of his succession 
being there — of his baptizing or being bishop there — of 
his prayers being felt there, &c. &c, we must clearly, 
even upon the showing of the Roman clergy, understand 
all such expressions to apply to the agency of those 
disciples of all the twelve apostles, who left Jerusalem, 
from time to time, for their various homes during the 
ten or twelve years that the apostles themselves re- 
mained in Jerusalem. Thus, as will be seen in the 
course of these pages, Salvianus says that the apostles 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 75 

taught at Carthage; St. Gildas, the monk, that Canter- 
bury was the see of St. Peter, or Peter's chair ; Gregory 
the Great, that Alexandria was Peter's see; he and the 
other popes, that the church of Alexandria was founded 
by this apostle; Optatus, that Carthage was Peter's 
chair; Dionysius, bishop of Corinth, that his church of 
Corinth was planted by St. Peter; Irengeus, bishop of 
Lyons, that the church of Lyons had Peter's succession ; 
Clement of Alexandria, that the church of Alexandria 
had it ; Tertullian, that our Lord's apostles baptized in 
the Tyber with as much efficacy as John the Baptist had 
done in the Jordan. The old Koman Calendar and St. 
Jerome, who is supposed to have published it, that Peter 
entered upon the bishopric of Rome under the emperor 
Tiberius, and immediately after the ascension of our 
Lord; St. Chrysostom, that the church of England was 
founded by St. Peter, and that many of his hearers were 
in Alexandria; Baronius, that he founded his see of 
Antioch without being present there at the time ; Aubes- 
pine, bishop of Orleans, that all the orthodox churches 
were sees of St. Peter ; and all the Roman-catholic writers 
that the first bishop of Alexandria was ordained by 
Peter. It would be evidently absurd to infer from such 
expressions, that Peter had been in these cities and 
countries ; yet this kind of inference is constantly being 
drawn by the Roman clergy with reference to Rome ; 
and it may not be an uninteresting or inappropriate illus- 
tration for the general reader, to find a celebrated Eng- 
lish priest and Jesuit engaged in this sort of work with 
regard to England. 

Father Personius, (Anglice, Robert Parsons), an 
English Jesuit, in the time of Elizabeth, eminent alike 
for his great learning and his great zeal, wrote a work 
called " The Three Conversions," in which he adduces, 
from testimonies of the foregoing character, what he and 
several others of his church considered to be demonstra- 
tion and clear proof of Peter's having been at Canterbury. 
Father Parsons enjoyed the favour of Pope Gregory XIII. 
to such an extent, that he was made rector of the college 



76 THE ANTEN1CENE RECORDS. 

founded at Rome expressly for proselytizing England, — 
was soon after sent over himself from Rome to contribute 
to the same end, — and was subsequently sent on a special 
mission from Rome to Madrid to Philip II. of Spain, 
to obtain a mitigation of the severities practised by that 
prince against the Spanish Jesuits, — a mission in which 
the favourite of the Vatican had great success. Among 
his most zealous friends he reckoned Cardinal Allen, 
and died at Rome, a.d. 1610. After going over the 
proofs that there are of the existence of the Christian 
church in England very soon after our Lord's ascension, 
this learned priest thus proceeds : — " And thus much of 
the time and occasion whereby the Christian religion 
began first in Britain within the first fifty years after 
Christ's ascension, whereto also we may add the testi- 
mony of Nicephorus, and, before him, of Theodo- 
retus and Sophronius, ancient writers, who do testify 
that c the British Islands fell in division among the apostles 
in their first partition which they made of the world. 1 And 
it is most like that St. Peter, being come to Rome to 
teach and convert the western parts of the world, as 
Italy, Spain, and France, these Islands also received the 
same benefit from him. And so say our authors, whom 
afterwards I shall allege, for his being in Britain. And 
this is another point of obligation betwixt England and 
Rome, to wit, that the first bishop of Rome went in 
person to convert our country, as afterwards we shall 
hear grave authors affirm, to whom I remit me." Here 
occurs a long parenthesis as to the names of those of the 
laity who preached the gospel in England before Peter, 
after which the learned Jesuit thus goes on: — u Where- 
fore, to let this pass, and to speak of the first ecclesiastical 
teachers of the Christian religion in England, who, 
through the great perturbation of wars (as hath been 
said), were not so well known, nor distinctly observed, 
nor delivered to writing in those days, as otherwise they 
might have been; yet find I some mention, though dis- 
persed, of three several apostles of Christ to have 
preached there, to wit, St. Peter, St. Paul, and St. Symon 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 77 

of Chananey, surnamed the Zealous; — two apostolical 
men also in these first troubled times to have been sent 
thither, — Aristobulus, a Roman whom St. Paul named 
in his Epistle to the Romans, and Joseph of Arimathea, 
a nobleman of Jury that buried Christ. Of all which 
five we shall speak somewhat in orden And, first, of 
St. Peter himself to have been in England (or Britain) 
and preached, founded churches, and ordained priests 
and deacons therein, is recorded, out of Greek antiquities 
by Metaphrastes, a Grecian, (Metaph. apud Surium, 
p. 862,) and it seemeth to be somewhat confirmed by 
that which Innocentius I., bishop of Rome, hath left 
written, above a thousand and two hundred years ago, 
saying, 4 That the first churches of Italy, France, Spain, 
Africa, Sicilia, and the islands that lie betwixt them, viere 
founded by St. Peter, or his scholars or successors. 1 (In- 
noc. Epist. ad Decent.) For which cause Gulielmus 
Ey sengrenius, in his ' First Centuria, or Hundred Years,' 
doth write also, ' That the first Christian churches of Eng- 
land were founded by St. Peter under Nero. 1 (Eyseng. 
cent. i. part 7, dist. 8.) Whereunto it may be thought 
that the foresaid Gildas had relation, when expostulating 
with the British priests of his time for their wickedness, 
(for which the wrath of God had brought in the English 
Saxons upon them,) he objecteth, among other things, 
''quod sedem Petri apostoli inverecundis pedibus usurp- 
assent,' (Gild. p. 2, de Excid. Brit.,) that they had 
usurped the seat of St. Peter with unshamefaced feet ; 
meaning thereby, either the whole church of Britain 
first founded by him, or some particular place of devo- 
tion or church which he had erected ; and finally Abredus 
Rienvallus, an English abbot of the order of Cisterce, 
left written, about five hundred years ago, a certain 
revelation, or apparition, of St. Peter to a holy man in the 
time of Edward the Confessor, showing him how he had 
preached himself in England, and consequently the parti- 
cular care he had of that church and nation, &c. (Aired, 
apud Sur. p. 131.) If any man ask what time it might 
be that St. Peter left Rome and went into Britain, and 



78 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

other countries round about, Cardinal Baronius, (vol. i. 
p. 512,) a famous learned historiographer of our time, 
thinketh that it was then when Claudius, the emperor, 
banished all the Jews out of Rome, (as in the Acts of the 
Apostles it is recorded,) among whom it is like that St. 
Peter also, being by nation a Jew, retired himself, and 
took that occasion to go into divers pagan countries to 
preach the faith of Christ, that thing belonging especially 
to his charge, as head of the apostles, according to his 
own words himself, ' God hath chosen and appointed that 
Gentiles should hear and believe the word of the gospel by 
my mouth, 1 (Acts xv.) This, then, was the cause why 
he was so diligent and careful to go and preach every- 
where the Christian religion, to the end he might fulfil 
and accomplish this will and ordination of his Master; 
and this was one cause, also, (to wit, his absence from 
Rome,) why, according to Baronius and other learned 
men, St. Paul, writing to the Romans, did not name or 
salute him in his Epistle, whereof our heretics do brabble 
much ; and thus much of St. Peter. Of St. Paul's being 
in Britain there are not so many particular testimonies, 
yet the foresaid Theodoretus doth affirm," &c. &c. 

Father Parsons, in imitation of Baronius about Peter's 
being at Rome, frequently afterwards alludes to the fore- 
going proof as complete and incontrovertible : — " Of 
Joseph of Arimathea's coming into France, and his send- 
ing thence into Great Britain, either by St. Philip, (as 
some say,) who preached then in Gaul, or (as others 
hold) by Peter himself, as he passed that way to and 
from Britain, and how he obtained," &c. &c. Again, — 
" Albeit St. Joseph came not immediately from Rome, 
nor was a Roman by birth, (as none of the apostles 
were,) yet he taught in England the Roman faith; that 
is to say, the same faith that St. Peter, and St. Paul, 
and Aristobulus, that came immediately from Rome, 
had taught before him, or did teach jointly with him in 
Britain." Again, — " For if this first preaching and 
first faith, taught in England by our first preachers, was 
the Roman faith, and derived principally from the city 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 79 

and church of Rome by the preaching of St. Peter and 
St. Paul, Aristobulus and others, as hath been declared, 
and if," &c. ; and again, — " Besides the proofs set down 
in the former chapter, how the chief of our first preachers 
came from Rome immediately, as St. Peter, St. Paul, 
and St. Aristobulus, and that the other," &c. (Treatise 
on the Three Conversions of England. Part i. chaps. 
i. and ii.) 

We have in all this a curious instance of the lengths 
to which the Roman clergy carry the practice of infer- 
ring Peter's personal presence in any city from the mere 
expression in the Fathers of his ecclesiastical relations to 
its church. But to return. I appeal to any Catholic, 
Roman or Protestant, who is in earnest in this inquiry, 
whether it has not been clearly shown, both from the 
Scriptures and from the fathers, from the acknowledged 
opinion of the Roman church herself, and from the 
common history of the Roman empire, that Peter's 
having founded the church at Rome is not to be sup- 
posed to imply his having come into Europe, or inter- 
mitted for a single day, that mission to the Jews of the 
Dispersion with which Paul so often reminds us that 
this apostle had been specially entrusted by our Lord. 



XV. 

Lucianus Charinus, (placed by Baratier in the second 
century, by others in the sixth,) wrote a work called 
" The Travels of the Apostles," which is wholly lost, and 
from which no one pretends to adduce any extract with 
the slightest reference to the present inquiry. " The 
whole book," says Photius, bishop of Constantinople, 
(a.d. 891,) in whose days it was to be seen, "contains 
nothing but childish and prodigious things, malicious 
fables, fallacies, follies, contradictions, and impieties." 
Mr. Baratier, (to whose collection of evidence the Cor- 
respondent in the Times attaches so much value,) after 
adverting at some length to Lucianus Charinus as an 



80 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

important authority on the subject, says that he is con- 
vinced this writer described Peter as having come into 
Europe, that many reasons convince him of it, but that 
he thinks it unnecessary to mention any of these reasons, 
as no one would think that writer worth attending to ! 
Must not that be a very doubtful historical fact, which 
can be supposed to receive the slightest support from 
such a witness? 



XVI. 

Clemens Alexandrinus, (about a.d. 217,) archbishop of 
Alexandria, is still relied on by a few of the Roman 
clergy, but certainly not with quite so much expectation 
as Irenaeus is, for making it appear that Peter must 
have left the East in the earlier years of his mission. In 
the same manner as Irengeus, in a work purporting to 
treat only of the local church of Rome, had said that 
Mark's Gospel was written after St. Peter had founded 
that church ; so Clement of Alexandria, in a statement 
purporting to have been derived from Irenseus, says that 
it was written " after Peter had effected the proclamation 
of the gospel at Rome." Peter could not have effected 
this, argue some of the Roman clergy, unless he had 
come into Europe for the purpose. 

The passage in question is one in which it is stated, 
— 1st. That the Gospel which Mark wrote, as St. Chrys- 
ostom assures us, in Egypt, was written at the instance 
of several of those Jewish converts who, " out of every 
nation under heaven," had been from time to time with 
Peter at Jerusalem, hanging with affection and delight 
upon the inspired eloquence of that apostle, among whom 
there were even Alexandrians applying for it, as Chrys- 
ostom informs us; and Romans, as we learn from 
Jerome and Epiphanius. 2nd. That the reason for 
Mark's being selected by them for this purpose, was his 
having been Peter's companion from an early period, 
which naturally afforded him more opportunity than 
others had of ascertaining the facts of our Lord's history 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 81 

from this apostle. 3rdly. That the want of this gospel 
does not appear to have been felt until Peter had dis- 
continued his general proclamation of the gospel in the 
different cities of the East and West, through those 
Jews that were constantly passing and re-passing be- 
tween these cities and Jerusalem, in which last city he 
was stationed, — in other words, that it was written after 
Peter, by his departure to Babylon, had broken off that 
general relation with the churches in which he was 
placed by his central residence at Jerusalem ; and 4thly, 
that Mark wrote it either before or after he was living 
at Babylon with St. Peter, as he wrote it from memory, 
and as Peter did not hear of it until it was finished. 
Eusebius thus puts this passage (vi. 14): "Again, in 
the same work, Clement also gives us a tradition respect- 
ing the order in which the gospels were written, derived 
from the elders of the preceding age, to this effect : — 
The gospels containing the genealogies were, it was said, 
first composed, and Mark's had the following origin : — 
After Peter had made proclamation of the word at 
Rome, and had announced it to all nations, with the 
assistance of the Spirit, those who had been with the 
apostle himself, and who amounted to a considerable 
number, urged Mark, as he had been Peter's companion 
from an early period and could remember his words, to 
commit to writing what he had taught them. Where- 
upon Mark composed his gospel, and gave copies of it 
to the applicants; which gospel, when Peter came to 
hear of its existence, he in the first instance neither pro- 
hibited nor recommended." 

The whole of the argument which the Roman clergy 
have founded upon this passage, proceeds upon the sup- 
position that, when we speak of "making proclamation 
of a thing anywhere," these words imply the personal 
presence of the party by whom this is said to have been 
effected. One single testimony will prove that this is a 
mistaken notion. Of the word which represents this 
expression in the Greek text, Henry Stephens says, in 
his Thesaurus, that it very frequently signifies to cause 

G 



82 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

proclamation to be made of anything, as well as to be 
actually the proclaiming party. u Not only those," says 
he, " who literally use their voice in publicly announcing 
anything, but also those who authorize them to do so, 
are said u to proclaim;" and this use of the Greek term 
is frequent." (kyipv<j<jhv dicuntur saepe non ipsi K^pvKeQ^ 
sed ii qui eos Kr\pvaauv jubent.) This authority alone 
shows the mistake into which the few of the Roman 
clergy we now speak of have fallen respecting the use 
of this Greek term, and will abundantly satisfy every 
conscientious inquirer upon the present subject. It may 
however be remarked that the same interpretation of the 
word is given in other Greek Lexicons, and that in the 
popular Lexicon of Dr. Donnegan, it is explained as 
meaning " to make publicly known," " to promulgate," 
u to announce openly;" none of which expressions imply 
the personal presence of the principal party mentioned, 
but merely the same kind of action as is implied when 
we say that the Prime-minister of England did so-and-so 
at Madrid. Of this common use of the term, as explained 
by Henry Stephens, we have an appropriate illustration 
in Thucydides, (i. 27.) " The Corinthian government 
proclaimed a colonizing expedition to Epidamnus." This 
it is evident does not mean that the different members 
of the Corinthian government went themselves over the 
country uttering words to that effect, but merely that 
they adopted whatever was the usual or most effectual 
method of solemn and general proclamation for the 
purpose. So, also, when the Roman clergy admit that 
the eight synagogues and 8000 Jews at this time (as 
Josephus tells us) at Rome, were sending up their 
deputations every year with their first fruit offerings to 
Jerusalem, and that Peter and the apostles were teach- 
ing the gospel to each succeeding deputation, in order 
that it should be again taught by them at Rome ; and 
that this continued for nearly a dozen years, would it 
not be very unreasonable to argue that Peter was not in 
this way proclaiming (K^pvaauv) the gospel in that 
city, and that he must have gone there to have enabled 
him to do so? Accordingly we find that even the vigi- 






THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 83 

lant Baronius did not see anything available in that 
expression. 

Cardinal Bellarmine and some others have put for- 
ward another supposition connected with this passage. 
They suppose that Clemens here asserts that Mark 
wrote his gospel at Rome! and thai Peter was with 
him at the time he wrote it! It will be at once 
seen that the words we are considering have nothing 
resembling either of these assertions, which are merely 
those fictions of the 14th and 15th centuries already ad- 
verted to in the chapter upon Papias, and in which the 
ideas of these writers appear to have been entangled. 
But it may be of use to show, en passant, that on both 
these points the exact contrary was the opinion of all 
the Fathers, although undoubtedly some of them say 
that Peter's Roman, as well as Alexandrian hearers, 
were among the most zealous of Mark's applicants. St. 
Chrysostom, in his allusion to the story, says in his first 
Homily upon Matthew: "It is said that Matthew, at 
the request of the Jewish converts, committed to writing 
for them what he taught orally, and that he composed 
that gospel in the Hebrew tongue ; and that Mark also 
did the same thing in Egypt, at the request of the dis- 
ciples there." Jerome, apparently from misunderstand- 
ing Eusebius, says that the Romans also made an appli- 
cation to Mark when he was among them, for the Gospel 
which he afterwards wrote in Egypt. (Rogatus Romas 
a fratribus .... breve scripsit evangelium. De vir. 
illus.) Epiphanius repeats this: " After the Hebrews 
made Matthew write, Mark, Peter's fellow traveller, was 
solicited at Rome to do the same ; and as soon as it was 
completed, he was invested with apostolic functions in 
Egypt by St. Peter." — (Epiphan. against the heresy of 
the Alogi, 51.) This is very far from saying that 
Mark's Gospel was not written in Egypt, and still 
farther from saying that it was written at Rome. Nor 
do any of the Fathers contradict Chrysostom upon the 
point in question. All agree that, wherever else Mark may 
have been petitioned on the subject, the Gospel that he 
wrote was written at Alexandria, and as much to gratify 

g2 



84 THE ANTENICENE KECOKDS. 

Peter's auditors in that as in any other city. Then, as 
to Peter's being with Mark at the time the latter wrote, 
all the Fathers agree in acknowledging that he was not. 
Papias says plainly that Mark had to write from memory ; 
Irenseus that Mark did not write until after Peter's 
death; Clemens Alexandrinus is reported as repeating 
what Papias said, adding that the existence of Mark's 
Gospel did not come to Peter's knowledge for some time 
after it was written; Eusebius repeats this addition of 
Clemens, and says that it was by divine revelation the 
thing came to Peter's knowledge ; all which expressions 
are allowed to be inconsistent with the supposition that 
Peter was then with Mark, and neither Jerome nor 
Epiphanius, nor any subsequent Father, has ever pre- 
tended to say he was. Thus, in no way can it be shown 
that Clemens Alexandrinus lends the slightest counte- 
nance to the story about Peter's having left the East. 



XYII. 

Caius (a.d. 218), an ecclesiastical writer and a Roman, 
makes nearly the same statement as Irenseus. He says 
that our Lord's apostles founded the church of Rome; 
and from this it is inferred, as in the case of Irenseus, 
that Peter (although here his name is not even men- 
tioned) must have come from Jerusalem into Europe 
before he went to Babylon. 

Caius seems to have been boasting of the genuineness 
of his church, and of the veneration in which the apostles 
were held at Rome — veneration so great that there seem 
to have been already two sets of monuments erected to 
their memory in that city ; one (the original one, no doubt) 
in the catacombs, the entrance of which was between the 
Via Appia, and the road to Ostia; the other on Mount 
Yaticanus, where the churches were first built as soon as 
they were allowed to be built above the ground. The work 
of Caius is lost, but his words on this point are preserved 
by Eusebius (ii. 25), who remarks that the two parts of 
Rome, here mentioned by Caius as having trophies of 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 85 

our Lord's apostles in the beginning of the 3rd century, 
were the same as those in which two handsome temples 
had just been placed by the Emperor Constantine, in 
the beginning of the 4th, in each of which buildings 
Sylvester, the bishop of Rome at that time, had just 
deposited equal portions of some supposed relics that he 
possessed of St. Peter and St. Paul. " Caius speaks thus," 
says Eusebius, " of the places in which Paul's and Peter's 
relics have been deposited : - 1 can show you the trophies 
— the martyrs' monuments — erected to the memory of 
our Lord's apostles ; for if you go to the hill called Vati- 
canus, or even to the road that leads to the harbour 
of Ostia, you will be able to find the trophies — the 
victorious records of those by whom this church was 
founded.'" 

In the Greek text (as I have said) there is no special 
mention whatever of St. Peter, of the importance of 
which omission the Roman clergy are very sensible ; for 
some of the more zealous of them boldly introduce his 
name when they quote these words. He is, nevertheless, 
unquestionably included among the rest of the apostles, 
all of whom are represented in the Roman Martyrolo- 
gies as having had trophies — as having borne witness 
to the faith, either in their lives or in their deaths, and 
are so described by Eusebius himself in his Commen- 
tary on the Psalms. For even St. John's tomb, when- 
ever it was constructed anywhere, had the " trophy," or 
emblems of martyrdom upon it, in consequence of all he 
suffered in his lifetime (Rev. i. 9), although it is univer- 
sally admitted that he died a natural death at Ephesus. 
Eusebius says, on Psalm lxxi. : " Every one of the 
apostles had a different termination allotted to his testi- 
mony." TTOLKlXoV VTTS/ULUVE TO TOV [ICtpTVpiOV TsXog. (He 

does not, however, say as Father Butler supposes, in his 
Life of St. Thomas, that every one of them died in 
consequence of the testimony he afforded) ; and Mont- 
faucon, the eminent Benedictine editor of that work, 
says : " It is now generally admitted that all the apostles 
underwent some kind of martyrdom," (apostolos omnes 
pro Christo passos esse.) All the apostles are also 



86 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

often spoken of in the Fathers as having " trophies " at 
Rome. " There is there," says St. Jerome, in one of 
his letters to Marcella, " there is there a holy church. 
There are there trophies of the apostles and of the 
martyrs." And again, in his Commentary on the For- 
tieth Chapter of Ezekiel, he says : " When I was a boy, 
and pursuing my studies at Rome, I used to go on Sun- 
days with other boys of the same disposition to visit the 
sepulchres of the apostles and the martyrs, and frequently 
went into the catacombs." The Roman clergy would 
not, I think, pretend to assume that the only apostles 
meant in such passages are Peter and Paul, the two 
patron saints of the Roman church ; but even if they do, 
even if we must understand that Caius meant to exclude 
the other eleven apostles from all share in the foundation 
of that church, and to speak of Peter and Paul as the 
only apostles who had trophies at Rome, we have already 
seen, in the section on Irenseus, that this supposition, 
strained as it is, affords not the slightest reason for 
thinking that Peter ever was in Europe. We have seen 
that his part in the foundation of that church might as 
well have been performed in the East as Paul's, and that 
(as Baronius long ago acknowledged) the scriptural ac- 
count of the foundation of the churches is utterly at 
variance with the theory of those few who hold that 
Peter must have been present in every city in the 
foundation of whose church he was considered to have 
a share. 

There is a second argument founded upon these 
words of Caius, one which is scarcely, indeed, defended by 
any Roman Catholic writer that I have met with ; but as 
the point which the Roman clergy think so important 
about Peter's not having been put to death at Babylon, 
where he himself speaks of his martyrdom as at hand, is 
supposed to gain an air of probability in the eyes of the 
general reader from this argument, they put forward 
that portion of the passage with more emphasis than, in 
reference to this question, it is entitled to. The argu- 
ment is this: As Peter's trophy, or martyr's tomb, 
(jULapTvpiov,) was at Rome, some of his relics must have 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 87 

been there; and, as his relics were there, he must have 
been put to death there. Why should his body, or any por- 
tion of it, have been there, (ask the uninitiated,) if he was 
not put to death there ? Why should his trophy be there, 
if his body, or some portion of it was not ? It will be seen 
from the following quotations, that trophies, or martyr's 
monuments, were constantly erected in cities where 
those to whose memory they were erected had neither 
lived nor died; that the bodies of martyrs were con- 
stantly removed to cities and places at a very great 
distance from the scene of their martyrdoms, and trophies 
there erected to their memory; and that it was no un- 
usual thing for a martyrium, or martyr's tomb, to have 
no body, or even part of a body, in it. All which points 
are fully acknowledged by all the Roman clergy. It 
will be seen, for instance, that there was a trophy of St. 
Stephen's at Ancona, not very far from Rome, con- 
structed immediately after his martyrdom, which took 
place in the East, and that neither his body, nor any 
part of it, was deposited beneath this trophy. It will 
be seen that St. Peter had another trophy at Constanti- 
nople, at the very time Eusebius was writing, and that 
no portion of Peter's body was there. We shall find, 
also, that the trophy of St. Laurentius was at Ravenna, 
although his body was not there, and although it was 
not there that he had been put to death ; that St. Andrew, 
Peter's brother, had a trophy at Constantinople, and that 
his remains were lying there in Eusebius's time, although 
it was at a distance of some hundred miles from that 
city that he was murdered ; and that, among numberless 
other cases of this description, Ignatius had his trophy 
at Antioch, with all that could be saved of his body 
placed beneath it, immediately after his martyrdom, 
which, it is well known, took place at Rome. It is no 
wonder, therefore, that the Roman clergy do not consider 
a trophy as any proof of the locality of a martyrdom, 
and that, as we shall see, even St. Augustine acknow- 
ledged it to be a matter of considerable uncertainty 
whether St. Peter's body was at Rome at all. 

The following is the account given by Eusebius of the 



88 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

magnificent niartyrium, or martyr's tomb, built by Con- 
stantine, at Constantinople, to the memory of all our 
Lord's apostles, about the same time as he rebuilt Peter's 
martyrium at Rome. The account occurs in the fourth 
book of the life of that emperor by Eusebius. 

" Chap, lviii. — On the Building of the Martyrium 
(Maprvpiov) of the Apostles at Constantinople. 

" After this he (the Emperor Constantine) proceeded 
to erect the martyrium to the memory of the apostles, in 
the city called by his own name. It was he who carried 
the whole of the sacred temple to its immense height, 
and brilliantly decorated it, by covering it from the foun- 
dation to the very roof with all kinds of coloured stones, 
in a sort of Mosaic work. He also made the ceiling of 
the lightest kind of filigree, richly gilt. The roof which 
protected the structure from the weather, was of copper 
instead of tiles ; and this also was profusely gilt, so as 
to dazzle one when the sun shone on it; and a sort of 
tracery, of copper and gold, beautifully carved, was 
placed all round the dome. 

" Chap. lix. — A further description of the same Mar- 
tyrium. 

" The temple was thus magnificently adorned by 
the emperor; and there was around it an uncovered 
space of great extent, without any buildings in it. In a 
quadrangular form round this, there ran a piazza, which 
enclosed this area for the temple ; and national buildings, 
laid out in baths and caravansaries for pilgrims, extended 
all along this piazza, besides several other apartments for 
the use of those who were in charge of the place." 

" Chap. lx. — That he also erected his own monument 
in it. 

" All these structures the emperor consecrated, for the 
purpose of perpetuating among all men the memory of 
the apostles of our Lord. He had, however, another 
object; one at first unknown, but afterwards evident to 
every one. He prepared a place there for himself when 
he should die, intending, with an extraordinary amount 
of Christian fervour, that his relics should participate, 
after death, in the designation of the church as that of the 



THE ANTENICENE KECOKDS. 89 

apostles ; so that after this life he might, as it were, profit 
by the prayers which, out of honour to the apostles, would 
be offered up to the Almighty in that place. He there- 
fore constructed there twelve tombs — sacred monu- 
ments — to the honour and memory of all our Lord's 
apostles, and placed a coffin for himself in the middle of 
them, so that six of the apostles were deposited (or 
lay) on each side of it. He thus wisely provided a 
place, as I have said, where his body, after this life, was 
to rest ; but he arranged these things, and consecrated 
this temple to the apostles long beforehand, in the hope 
that while he lived it would promote his eternal welfare 
to honour their memory in this way." 

St. Chrysostom, the archbishop of Constantinople, 
(for Constantinople, Babylon, Jerusalem, Alexandria, 
and Antioch, were all archbishoprics,) often afterwards 
alludes to this as St. Peter's tomb, or trophy to which 
great multitudes of pilgrims came ; and considers, that by 
its construction Constantinople was, with regard to this 
apostle, placed upon exactly the same footing as Rome. 
In his 26th Homily, on 2 Corinth., {vol. x. p. 741, 
Benedictine Edition, 1834,) after speaking of the tombs 
of our Lord's apostles in some cities as surpassing in 
splendour the residences of the emperors, he goes on 
thus : — " For he who wears the purple goes to those mo- 
numents to kiss them, and, putting aside his ornaments, 
begs of the saints to intercede for him with God, (this 
was in the fifth century. ) Yes, crowned though he be, 
he entreats the dead fisherman and the tent-maker to 
be his friends : . . . . and this is to be seen, not only at 
Rome, but at Constantinople. For at Constantinople 
the son of the great Constantine thought that he con- 
ferred a high honour on his father when he deposited his 
body in the vestibule of the fisherman ; so that the em- 
perors performed in their sepulchre that office for the 
fishermen which the door-keepers performed in the 
palaces for the emperors." And again, to the same 
effect, in his Homily " Quod Christus sit Deus," {vol. i. 
p. 697,) speaking of the veneration in which our Lord's 
apostles were everywhere held, and especially in the two 



90 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

great capitals of the empire, the archbishop says : — " See 
how it is at Rome ; the emperors, the consuls, the generals, 
leave all their state and repair .to the tombs of the 
fisherman and the tent-maker ; and, at Constantinople, 
those who wore the crown thought it a happy thing to 
have their bodies buried, not even close to the apostles, 
but in the space outside their doors, and thus the em- 
perors became thenceforth the doorkeepers of the fisher- 
men. And again, in his Homily " Against the Games 
and Theatres," on the occasion of a great storm which 
occurred at Constantinople, three days before he was 
speaking, he says : — " Prayers were offered up to the 
Almighty, and our whole city rushed to where the 
apostles were, and took refuge with the holy Peter and 
and his blessed brother Andrew, that apostolic union, 
with Paul also and Timothy. And when the storm was 
over, we (the inhabitants of Constantinople) boldly 
traversed the floods, and ran to the leaders of the 
apostles — to Peter, the foundation of the faith — to Paul, 
the vessel of election, — celebrating a spiritual festival, 
and proclaiming their contests and their trophies." 
The Benedictine editors suppose Chrysostom here to 
allude, in the second clause, to a second martyrium of 
St. Peter's, on the other side of the Bosphorus, within 
the archbishopric. It is unnecessary to add, that no 
one ever considered Peter to have been put to death in 
any part of the Bosphorus, and but very few that his 
body was deposited in any of the martyr's tombs that 
were erected in that neighbourhood to his memory. 

Nor did St. Augustine consider that a martyrium im- 
plied the presence of the martyr's body. With all his 
enthusiasm for the church at Rome, he does not scruple 
to mention it as a mere saying and an uncertainty that 
Peter's reliquise were lying at Rome, although there never 
was a doubt that this apostle had one of his martyria 
with its trophy there from the very earliest period, 
whether as a little oratory in the catacombs, or as a 
stately church upon the Vatican Hill. " Men speak," 
says St. Augustine, " as if Peter's relics were at Rome;" 
or, "It is said that Peter's relics are at Rome." ( Jacet 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 91 

Petri corpus Eomse, dicunt homines. Serm. 296.) 
Would he have used such an expression if it were an 
ascertained fact that Peter's body had been deposited at 
Eome, or even if it were supposed that the martyrium 
implied the relics ? He also states in the most unreserved 
and open manner that in his day Laurentius the martyr 
had a martyr's tomb at Ravenna, though he was not 
put to death there (Laurentii memoria apud Ravennam. 
Serm. 322), but that the remains of this martyr were at 
that very time deposited at Rome (Laurentii corpus 
Romas jacet. Serm. 296.) 

The foregoing quotations are sufficient to show us how 
little the erection of an apostle's martyrium or trophy in 
a city had, in the judgment of the fathers, to do with his 
having been put to death there, or even with the presence 
there of the smallest portion of the body. Let us now 
attend to the opinions and statements of the Roman 
clergy on this subject. 

Baronius says in his Index : " The least fragment of 
the relics of any saint is equivalent to the entire of that 
saint's body." (Minima pars reliquiarum alicujus sancti 
eandem vim habet quam totum corpus.) And again 
(a.d. 55, paragraph 15): " As there is in the smallest 
portion of any martyr's relics the same efficacy as there 
would be in his whole body, the body of one martyr was 
usually divided into several small portions, and was thus 
placed under different altars; for in the martyria, or 
temples of the martyrs, the altars are their tombs. And 
doubtless it was from the various minute portions of the 
body being dispersed in different places, and having in 
each the same efficacy as if they were all there together, 
that the body of one and the same martyr was supposed 
to be deposited in several different cities; a mistake 
which we may well excuse, as it arose not from human 
imposture but from the divine bounty; for each city 

IMAGINED ITSELF POSSESSED OF THE MARTYR'S BODY, ON 
ACCOUNT OF THE TROPHY OR TOMB ERECTED ill Consequence 

of this efficacy; and, as we have said, the tomb was 
always the altar of the martyr's oratory, or martyTium, 
as it was called in the Greek language." (Cum igitur 



92 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

eandem virtutem in exigua parte reliquiarum martyris, 
quae in toto sit corpore, inesse, experimento ipse (Gre- 
gorius Nazianzenes) testetur; hide evenit ut corpus 
unius martyris in plures interdum partes dividi soleret, 
recondique in diversis altaribus, quae sepulchra sunt 
martyrum; indeque fortasse accidit ut cum unius ejus- 
demque martyris diversis in locis reliquiae conditaa habe- 
rentur, et seque ac si integrum corpus ubique horum 
locorum conditum esset, eadem miracula sint operate, 
unius ejusdemque martyris corpus diversis in locis haberi 
dicatur. Tolerabilis error cui non hominum impostura, 
sed exuberans divina largitas prsebuit occasionem; dum 
quod, ob virtutis prasstantiam, diversis in locis sit unius 
ejusdemque martyris erecta memoria, vel excitatum se- 
pulchrum (quod esse consuevit sacrum altare) quisque 
apud se corpus illius habere est opinatus. a.d. 55, 
paragraph 15 ;) where see much more to the same effect. 

We here see, upon the authority of the Roman church 
herself that martyrs' tombs were built, and the bodies 
of martyrs constantly supposed to be in cities where the 
martyrs did not suffer, and where there was nothing 
more than some very small portion of their bodies, or of 
something belonging to them; and this, the cardinal 
tells us, was quite usual. The following quotations will 
afford the general reader some illustrations of it. He 
will also see from them that nothing was of more ordi- 
nary occurrence than to remove the whole of the remains 
from the country of the martyrdom to very distant 
places, either after the lapse of years, or immediately 
upon the martyrdom having taken place, and to erect 
trophies over them, — for the trophy was the palm-leaf, 
the cross, &c, placed upon the monument of the martyr. 

We learn from the venerable Bede, (who is a 
canonized saint of the Roman church,) that the remains 
(he uses the word denoting the whole of the remains,) 
of St. Peter, together with those of other martyrs who 
had trophies at Rome, were deposited at Canterbury, 
a.d. 656, a fact which does not appear to be generally 
known. Yet we have Pope Vitalian's letter to king 
Oswy of England, which accompanied these remains to 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 93 

our shores; and Baronius does not attempt to deny 
the truth of the account nor the authenticity of the 
letter. He says, as might be expected, very little on 
the subject; neither whether they were ever returned, 
nor whether it was all or only a part of each saint that 
was sent. The pope writes thus : " We have ordered 
the blessings of the Saints — for so we call the remains 
(reliquias) — of the blessed apostles Peter and Paul, and 
of the holy martyrs (not apostles) St. Lawrence, St. 
John, and St. Paul, St. Gregory, and St. Pancras, to be 
delivered to your messengers, (who are also the bearers 
of this, our letter,) to be by them again delivered faith- 
fully to your Highness. For even to your royal consort, 
our spiritual daughter, we have by the aforesaid mes- 
sengers sent," &c. &c. (Hist. Eccles. iii. 29.) Father 
Butler adds, (upon what authority he does not say,) 
" that it was only a portion of St. Pancras's body that 
was sent to England upon this occasion." 

St. Andrew, the brother of St. Peter, is believed by 
the Eoman clergy to have suffered his martyrdom at 
Patrse, in Peloponnesus. After stating this, Butler (in 
his Lives of the Saints) thus proceeds: "The body of 
St. Andrew was translated from Patrae to Constanti- 
nople, a.d. 357, together with those of St. Luke and St. 
Timothy, and deposited in the church of the apostles, 
which Constantine the Great had built a little before. 
.... The churches of Milan, Nola, Brescia, and some 
other places, were at the same time enriched with small 
portions of these relics, as we are informed by St. 
Ambrose, St. Gauclentius, St. Paulinus, and others. 
When the city of Constantinople was taken by the 
French, Cardinal Peter, of Capua, brought the relics 
of St. Andrew thence into Italy, and deposited them in 
the cathedral of Amalphi, where they still remain." 

Butler also writes thus (in his article on Luke) : 
" St. Hippolytus says, St. Luke was crucified at Elaea, in 

Peloponnesus, near Achaia The bones of St. 

Luke were translated from Patras, in Achaia, a.d. 357, 
by order of the Emperor Constantius, and deposited in 
the church of the Apostles at Constantinople, together 



94 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

with those of St. Andrew and St. Timothy. On the 
occasion of this translation, some distribution was made 
of the relics of St. Luke. St. Gaudentius procured a 
part for his church at Brescia; St. Paulinus possessed a 
portion in St. Felix's church at Nola, and with a part 
enriched a church which he built at Fondi. The mag- 
nificent church of the Apostles at Constantinople was 
built by Constantine the Great, whose body was de- 
posited in the porch, in a chest of gold, the twelve 
apostles standing round his tomb. When this church 
was repaired, by an order of Justinian, the masons found 
three wooden chests or coffins, in which, as the inscrip- 
tions proved, the bodies of St. Luke, St. Andrew, and 
St. Timothy were interred. Baronius mentions that 
the head of St. Luke was brought by St. Gregory from 
Constantinople to Rome, and laid in the church of his 
monastery of St. Andrew. Some of his relics are kept 
in the great Grecian monastery on Mount Athos, in 
Greece." 

Baronius (in his Annals, a.d. 637, paragraph 1,) says: 
"It is certain that at this time several bodies of saints, 
both martyrs and confessors, were brought into Europe 
and placed in different cities, either at Rome or Venice, 
or elsewhere. There is a general report that Ignatius' s 
remains were then brought to Rome from Antioch 



Moreover, St. Mark's body was brought over at a still 
later period to Venice from Alexandria." 

We have an account in Butler's " Lives of the Saints," 
of five of the martyria (memorise, or oratories) that were 
erected to the memory of St. Stephen in places at various 
distances from Jerusalem, in which city he was put to 
death ; in the earliest and most famous of which it will 
be seen that there was no portion whatever of St. 
Stephen's body. This writer states that Stephen was 
not buried at Jerusalem, where he was stoned, but at a 
place about twenty miles from Jerusalem, called Caphar- 
gamala, or borough of Gamaliel ; that after Stephen was 
stoned by the Jews, outside the north gate of Jerusalem, 
his body was left exposed one day and one night upon 
the spot where he died; that Gamaliel, who instructed 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 95 

Paul, the apostle, in the law, had it carried off in the 
night-time to Caphargamala, where he lived, and that he 
had it interred there, twenty miles from the scene of the 
martyrdom; that it was discovered there a.d. 415, for 
the first time, and part of it at once taken possession of 
by the archbishop of Jerusalem, as it was found in his 
diocese, the rest being left in the martyrium at Caphar- 
gamala. 

Butler then proceeds thus : " The relics of this saint 
( Stephen) were soon dispersed in many places. Portions 
of them were brought with great devotion into Europe 
and Africa. Avitus, a Spanish priest, who then lived in 
Palestine, obtained of Lucian (the priest of Caphar- 
gamala), out of the part which he had reserved for him- 
self, some of the dust of the flesh, and a little portion of 
the small bones of the martyr, which he sent to Pal- 
conius, bishop of Braga (in Spain), his native place." 

Again: " Some of the martyr's blood contained in a 
vial, and some small fragments of his bones, which 
certain monks had procured from Palestine, arrived at 
Uzalis, in Africa ; and before the oratory of the relics of 
St. Stephen, at Uzalis, was placed a veil on which the 
saint was painted carrying a cross upon his shoulders." 
These relics, we hear, performed great cures, and at- 
tracted immense pilgrimages of the faithful. 

Butler also mentions that at Calama, another city of 
Africa, in Numidia, there was another martyrium or 
chapel of St. Stephen, enriched with some of his relics, 
the cures effected by which are almost incredible. 

Butler also writes thus: "The church of Hippo (in 
Africa), was enriched with a portion of these relics, a.d. 
425. St. Augustine (the bishop of Hippo), in his 317th 
sermon, says those relics consisted of a little dust into 
which his sacred flesh was reduced, shut up in a case. 
An altar was there raised, not to St. Stephen, but to God, 
over the relics of St. Stephen." 

And thus: u St. Augustine relates (sermon 323), that 
a certain person, who was present at the martyrdom of 
St. Stephen, picked up one of the stones that had struck 



96 THE ANTENICENE KECORDS. 

the martyr's arm, and brought it afterwards to Ancona, 
in Italy, where from that time there began to be there a 
trophy or memorice, as it was called — that is, an oratory, 
of St. Stephen's, says that Father. When the Christians 
had the liberty to erect churches, a famous one, in honour 
of St. Stephen, was built on this account, near Ancona, 
which is mentioned by St. Gregory." Pilgrims innumer- 
able from all parts of Christendom flocked to this shrine. 

The only other case I shall mention is that of Ignatius. 
" He arrived at Rome the 20th of December," says 
Butler in his Life, " the last day of the public entertain- 
ments. He was hurried into the amphitheatre. Two 
fierce lions being let out upon him, they instantly de- 
voured him, leaving nothing of his body but the larger 
bones .... His bones were taken up and carried to 
Antioch, and there laid in a chest as an inestimable trea- 
sure. They were first laid in the cemetery outside the 
Daphnitic gate (of Antioch), but in the reign of 
Theodosius the Younger, a.d. 438, were translated 
thence with great pomp to a church in the city, which 
had been a temple of Fortune, but from this time bore 
his name. They are now at Rome. The regular canons 
at Arouaise, near Bapaume, in Artois, the Benedictine 
monks at Liesse, in Haynault, and some other churches, 
have obtained each some bone of this glorious martyr. 
His martyrdom happened a.d. 107." 

Baronius says : " When Ignatius had undergone his 
martyrdom in the theatre at Rome, his body was imme- 
diately conveyed to Antioch, from city to city, upon the 
shoulders of the faithful," (a.d. 55, paragraph 17,) and 
this fact is stated or alluded to in many of the Fathers. 

Thus we see that the Roman clergy do not consider 
that the mere circumstance of Peter's having had a 
martyrium or oratory at Rome, was the slightest reason 
for supposing that he was put to death there (whatever 
other reason they may have for thinking so), and that 
(as St. Augustine tells us) it was not even a reason for 
supposing that his body, or any portion of his body, was 
lying there. 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 97 

The Correspondent in the Times goes farther than any- 
other commentator on this passage of the writer Caius. 
He is not satisfied with suggesting that there may have 
been relics beneath the trophies. He boldly says, that 
Caius here states that it was the Vatican hill that was 
the depository of Peter's, and that the Ostian road was 
the place allotted to St. Paul's ! — a distinction of which 
there is not the slightest trace in the original, in which 
it is not even said that there were any portions at all 
of the bodies of the apostles beneath their trophies at 
Eome. 



XVIII. 

St. Hippolytus about (A.D.250),an eastern bishop, it is not 
known exactly of what place, is supposed to be described 
in a little poem by Prudentius, a Spanish poet, in the 
fifth century, as speaking of " Peter's chair," but without 
saying anything that would lead us to suppose that he 
thereby meant either the Roman or any one other local 
church, or, in fact, in any way connecting the name of 
Rome with it ; and this Baronius brings forward as satis- 
factory, nay, as "brilliant" evidence of Peter's having 
made a journey into Europe, either before or after he 
went to Babylon. 

In the first place, however, it is to be observed, that 
the testimony is that only of Prudentius, in the fifth 
century, and not at all that of St. Hippolytus in the 
third, who said nothing whatever on the subject in his 
works. In the second place, the words occur in a Latin 
poem, written in metre, without the slightest pretension 
to historical accuracy. Thirdly, the words " Let no 
faith flourish but that which Peter's chair and Paul 
preserve," (Prud. in Peristeph. 11,) do not even suggest 
Rome, or the church there, except to the mind already 
irresistibly imbued with the misconception, — as the same 
words are, we have seen, constantly applied to number- 
less other churches. Fourthly, even if it was the local 

H 



98 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

church at Rome only, and not the whole church of Christ 
that was meant here by the expression, that would 
evidently not prove that Peter had been in Europe, as 
we know that the church of Carthage was called " Peter's 
chair," though Peter never was at Carthage, and that 
Alexandria was called the " chair," as well as the " see 
of St. Peter," although Peter never was in Egypt ; nay, 
that in the very time of Prudentius, Canterbury was 
called "Peter's chair," although Peter never was in 
England. But, fifthly, even if all this were otherwise, 
almost every writer admits that the Hippolytus men- 
tioned by Prudentius was some priest of that name, and 
not the bishop. Nor is that all. Baronius himself, 
upon another occasion, acknowledged that it was very 
evident to him that the poet had confounded three very 
different persons under the same name, — a priest, a 
bishop, and a soldier ! "It must not be forgotten," says 
the cardinal, on the Eoman Martyrology, "that this 
writer has confounded together three persons named 
Hippolytus, — a soldier, a priest, and a bishop, — and that 
he has related, as of one party, the acts of the three." 
How, then, could anything said by the Hippolytus of 
this poem be laid before an enlightened public as having 
been said by St. Hippolytus the bishop ? 



XIX. 

An Anonymous Author (in Eusebius, v. 28, and placed 
by Baratier in the early part of the third century) 
speaks of a person as being "the thirteenth bishop of 
Rome from the times of the apostle Peter." It is thence 
inferred, but I must say, only by those who are inex- 
perienced in the language of the Fathers, that the apostle 
Peter must have been bishop of Rome, and therefore 
that he must have lived there. 

In reply to this argument for Peter's having left 
the East, it is sufficient to state that all the ecclesiastical 
historians date the transactions of the churches from 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 99 

the apostles, without thereby meaning to imply that the 
apostles were bishops of those churches. St. Theodoret 
begins his "Ecclesiastical History" with this remark : "As 
Eusebius began his history from the blessed apostles, to 
record all that occurred in the churches until the reign 
of Constantine, I shall begin my work' from the end of 
his." And this account of the expression is admitted 
by all the Roman-catholic commentators. Carminus 
Fimianus, royal professor of theology at Naples, and 
to whom we are indebted for a very line edition of 
the works of archbishop De Marca, writes as follows, 
in the preface to the fourth volume of that work: 
" When Eusebius says that any one was third or sixth 
bishop of Rome ' after Peter and Paul/ or 4 from the 
apostles,' he does not mean that these apostles, or that all 
the apostles, were bishops of Kome. That all the apostles 
who lived at Jerusalem were bishops of Jerusalem, is 
what nobody thought. Eusebius himself did not think 
so; for he considered only James to be its bishop. 
Nevertheless, this very Eusebius says that Narcissus 
was the thirteenth bishop of Jerusalem from the apostles. 
St. Jerome in his catalogue of ecclesiastical writers, 
says that James was the bishop of Jerusalem after the 
apostles. Now, as it is agreed on all hands that the 
apostles were not bishops of Jerusalem, and that only 
James was so, it necessarily follows that neither the 
expression c from the apostles/ nor the expression c after 
the apostles/ is any reason for supposing that the apostles 
were bishops of Jerusalem. And by a like process of 
reasoning (pari modo), when Eusebius says that any one 
was bishop of Rome 'after Peter and Paul/ or third, 
fifth, seventh, 'from the apostles/ it is not from such 
expressions that we can infer the episcopal character of 
these apostles." Valesius also acknowledges that how- 
ever frequently Eusebius used this language with refer- 
ence to Rome, he never meant to imply in it, that any 
of the apostles was a bishop of that church. Valesius 
writes thus: " Irenseus and Eusebius say that Peter and 
Paul laid the first foundations of the church of Rome, 

h 2 



100 THE ANTENICENE KECOKDS. 

but they nowhere reckon them among the bishops of 
that church." (Eos in Episcoporum ordine nequaquam 
recensent. Valesius on Euseb. iii. 21.) And again, — 
" It must not be forgotten that Eusebius never speaks 
of any of the apostles as a bishop." (Sciendum est Eu- 
sebiam apostolos in ordine Episcoporum minime Dume- 
rare ut supra notavi. Ibid. ) As it is admitted, therefore, 
by the Eoman Catholics, that the phrase in question does 
not involve the supposed sense, it cannot be inferred 
from it, in any case, that Peter lived at Eome. And 
that Peter's name, as so often elsewhere, is above em- 
ployed by this anonymous writer to represent all the 
apostles, and not Peter alone, is proved by Eusebius 
(iv. 5), where, in a clause exactly parallel, Telesphorus 
is said to be " the eighth bishop of Eome from the 
apostles." He even says (iv. 1) that "Primus was the 
fourth bishop from the apostles at Alexandria;" where 
not one of the apostles ever was. 

But over and above all this, with which every classical 
scholar is well acquainted, and which will be further 
illustrated in the fifth section on Eusebius, Cardinal Bel- 
larmine very honestly and ingenuously acknowledges that 
Peter's being considered bishop of Eome would not be a 
legitimate indication of his having ever resided in that 
city. Several persons whom Bellarmine enumerates, 
and whose names will be found in another page, were, 
this cardinal reminds us, spoken of and considered as 
the bishops at Eome, although, as he truly adds, they 
never in their lives had even seen Eome ; and we know 
that with respect to Asiatic bishoprics, a similar practice 
still prevails in the Eoman church. I cite Bellarmine 
here, not because I have any doubt as to whether the 
Eoman- catholic reader will consider what has been 
above said abundantly sufficient to show the utter 
emptiness of the alleged testimony, but because it is im- 
portant that he should be made to see the miserable 
shifts (if they will pardon me the expression) to which 
his clergy are reduced in their efforts — conscientious 
efforts it may often be — to show that Peter was sup- 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 101 

posed by the ancients to have been in person at Rome. 
To do this in the present case they are compelled to 
ignore the most ordinary usages of their church, and 
the most ordinary principles of patristic phraseology. 



XX. 

Sextos Julius Aericanus, the writer of a chronology, 
(about a.d. 250,) is supposed to have said in his work, 
now lost, that Peter was put to death at Rome. The 
grounds of this supposition, as stated by Baratier, are 
that a barbarous writer of a much later period, or a 
writer named Barbarus, (for it is not known which,) has 
left us a chronology, consisting of extracts from the 
similar works of Sextus Julius Africanus, Eusebius, and 
others ; and that as this writer, " Barbarus," mentions 
something about Peter's having been put to death at 
Rome, which is not mentioned in Eusebius, he must 
therefore have taken this from Sextus Julius Africanus ! 
This is one of the testimonies of young Baratier, de 
scribed by the Correspondent in the Times as Constituting 
"thorough proof." I need only reply, what is obvious to 
every one, that "Barbarus" may have taken his statement 
from some of the other and much later writers to whom 
he had access, and from whom Scaliger, his only editor, 
says that he gave extracts. 



XXL 

Tertullian (about a.d. 250), a priest of Carthage, 
who is admitted on all hands to write in a highly figura- 
tive and turgid style, with Rome intervening between 
him and the church of Jerusalem, and who naturallv 
sought to array in every kind of attractive imagery that 
one of the first churches to which, purely on account (as 
he himself says, ) of its proximity, Carthage was in the 
habit of appealing in her controversies, makes two meta- 



102 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

phorical allusions to St. Peter's scriptural connexion 
with the church of Kome. In one of these the apostle 
is said to have baptized in the Gentile rivers, and there- 
fore in the Tyber ; in the other to have been a martyr 
in the Gentile as well as Jewish churches, and therefore 
(as the Roman clergy understand the passage) to have 
died in the church of Rome. It is supposed that this 
language of Tertullian is much more to be depended on 
for Peter's history than those passages in Scripture in 
which we read of the apostle's special mission to the 
countries in which there were most Jews, and of his 
residence at Babylon, when his martyrdom was at hand, 
—and this, although up to this time (the middle of the 
third century ) no writer of any kind had called in ques- 
tion the scriptural account of his mission or his death. 

The character given by the Roman clergy of Ter- 
tullian' s manner of expressing himself is as follows : 
" He was (says Father Dupin) of a very quick, sprightly, 
and sharp temper; but he had not all that exactness 
and clearness that might have been wished. He often 
stretches things too far. He is warm and transported 
almost upon everything. He is full of figures and 
hyperboles. If he does not persuade by his reasonings, 
he at least forces consent by that pompous way of ex- 
pression whereby he sets them out." u As to Tertullian's 
style," says Father Ceillier, u it cannot be denied that it is 
harsh, unpolished, obscure, and sometimes too inflated," - 
(trop enfle.) We surely are entitled to take some ac- 
count of so very marked a style of composition. 

On one occasion when this writer is insisting, with his 
usual vehemence, that it is unimportant as to what water 
we are baptized in, and that there is no difference in this 
respect between the Jewish and the Gentile river — be- 
tween John the Baptist, who was restricted to the Jordan, 
and the twelve apostles of our Lord, who had all the 
rivers of the earth before them (Matt, xxviii. 19) — he 
puts the matter briefly thus : " Can there be any differ- 
ence between those whom John baptized in the Jordan 
and Peter in the Tyber?" (De Baptism, c. 4.) JSTo 



THE ANTENJCENE EECOEDS. 103 

reader of histor}^ no sincere inquirer after religious 
truth, Trill look upon such a passage as in itself a plain 
indication that Peter was supposed to have come into 
Europe. It may lead such a person to inquire whether 
it was supposed that Peter had done so ; but it will not 
lead him to conclude that Tertullian certainly understood 
he had. Every one will admit that the same words 
might have been used in a metaphorical sense, and that 
if Peter's disciples baptized in the Tyber, it was in effect 
the same thing as if Peter himself had done so. But 
besides all this, which is so obvious to the most careless 
reader, Tertullian himself, though fond of metaphor, and 
perhaps exactly because he was so, often takes more 
pains not to have this style of writing misunderstood 
than more prosaic writers would have done, and he does 
so here. With regard to this particular case of Peter's 
being said to do things (tingere, Ki?pu<r<Tai>, &c.) in the 
different cities in which there were local churches, Ter- 
tullian offers the following ver}^ appropriate remark a few 
chapters further on, in the same treatise in which the 
passage occurs that we are now considering : " Our Lord 
came, they say, and did not baptize, (for John the 
evangelist says, although Jesus himself baptized not, but 
his disciples) as if it was meant that our Lord would 
baptize literally with his own hands (revera suismanibus 
tincturum). The expression, however, is not to be un- 
derstood in this literal way, but in the natural and 
ordinary sense of such expressions; (non utique sic in- 
telligendum est sed simpliciter, dictum, more comnuni,) 
as when we say, for instance, the emperor proclaimed a 
decree, or the governor scourged some prisoner, are we to 
suppose that it was the emperor himself, or the governor 
himself, Avho did this ? Certainly not. A thing is always 
said to be done by the person through whose deputy it is 
done;" (c. 11.) and that Tertullian understood this to 
apply to those Roman converts whom Peter sent from 
Jerusalem to Rome, " preaching the word," is further 
proved by his adding almost immediately afterwards: 
" I take it for granted that he who was permitted to 



104 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

proclaim was permitted also to baptize." (c. 14.) So 
that not only is the expression itself opposed to the 
literal interpretation which some of the Roman clergy 
have deceived themselves into supposing it to bear, but 
Tertullian himself, who used it, warns us against that 
very interpretation. Those, therefore, if there be any, 
who still think that the words under consideration must 
mean that Peter baptized literally with his own hands in 
the Tyber, and could not possibly mean anything else, 
are bound at least to tell us upon what grounds they 
depend for this peculiar opinion. Neither Baronius nor 
Bellarmine, nor even Father M c Corry, considered that 
this passage afforded any evidence. 

The other passage, in any sense that we take it, has a 
less marked reference to Rome itself. The most that can 
be made of it is to the effect that Peter died in the church 
of Rome — that he was crucified a founder of that 
church — that his martyrdom belonged to it as well as to 
any other — and from this they infer that he must have 
died within the very walls of the imperial city. But upon 
what principle can it be pretended that the mere fact of 
his having, in ecclesiastical language, died in the Roman 
church, necessarily implies that he must have died at 
Rome? Had the Roman church then none of its mem- 
bers, none of its founders, scattered and martyred in 
other countries? The passage is " Happy church!" sup- 
posed to be said exclusively of the Roman Christians. 
" Happy church ! into which, with their lives, our Lord's 
apostles poured forth all their doctrine! In which St. 
Peter and his Master both suffered the same death ! In 
which St. Paul was decapitated as well as John the 
Baptist ! and in which St. John the evangelist was ba- 
nished from Ephesus to Patmos, after rising unscathed 
from flaming oil." (See Father M c Corry's translation 
in the Appendix.) The unbiassed reader will see at 
once that all this refers not to the local church of Rome, 
but to the universal church of Christ. Let us, how- 
ever, first consider the passage in the limited sense in 
which the Roman clergy profess to understand it, as 
applied to the local church of Rome only. In the first 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 105 

place, Peter was in reality, and was always spoken of as 
one of the founders of the Roman church. He was 
always therefore, especially by the Africans and Komans, 
associated with it ; and was always regarded by them in 
that light when his crucifixion is spoken of, although 
that, as he tells us, was at hand while he was at 
Babylon. When, therefore, we are told that he died in 
the Roman church, or for the Roman church (as the 
word " ubi" in reference to " ecclesise" here indicates 
either of these loose relations), what is there in such 
forms of expression to justify us in allowing ourselves to 
be thereby diverted from our steadfast faith in the plain 
narrative of our Holy Scriptures? In the second place, 
St. John the evangelist, one of the eleven who stood up 
with Peter to co-operate with him in the foundation of the 
churches, is here mentioned as having been banished from 
Ephesus to Patmos, in or for the Roman church, in the 
same sense and in the same way as Peter was crucified at 
Babylon, in it or for it (Felix ecclesia ubi Johannes rele- 
gatur), a banishment most unambiguously outside the 
walls, however much it may be regarded as within the 
church, of Rome. St. Chrysostom, in his first Homily on 
the Epistle to the Ephesians, says of their city : "St. John 
the evangelist resided there a long time. It was there he 
was when he was banished. It was there he died. There 
also St. Paul left Timothy;" and in this statement of St. 
Chrysostom all the rest of the Fathers, without one single 
exception, acquiesce; nor do I know of any Roman- 
catholic writer who contradicts it. Irenaeus, Clement of 
Alexandria, Polycrates, one of the earliest bishops of 
the church of Ephesus, Origen, Eusebius, Jerome, and 
many more, mention St. John's banishment from Ephesus 
and his return to that city; none of them contradicting 
what St. Chrysostom says, that he was at Ephesus when 
this took place — none of them saying that he ever was at 
Rome then or at any other time. Is it not evident, then, 
that if St. John gave his life and doctrine to the church 
of Rome, and was one of its founders (as he undoubt- 
edly was), when he was banished from Ephesus to 
Patmos, and when he died at Ephesus (as all the Roman 



106 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

clergy admit he did), is it not evident, I sa}^, that Peter's 
being said to have given his life and his doctrine to the 
same church, and to have undergone his crucifixion in 
it, does not imply that it was within the walls of Rome 
that he did so ? If St. John's banishment could be said 
to have taken place in the Roman church when John 
Avas, as all the Fathers tell us, at Ephesus, so Peter's 
crucifixion could have taken place in it when he was, as 
the Scriptures tell us, at Babylon. If one assertion is 
not contrary to what the Fathers say, there is no neces- 
sity for supposing that the other contradicts the Scrip- 
tures. 

All this is so evident, that scarcely any of the Roman- 
catholic writers venture to dispute it. They have, 
therefore, set up another argument upon the passage. 
They pretend, that though St. John was at Ephesus 
when he was banished to Patmos and when he returned 
from his banishment, and also that it was at Ephesus 
he died ; yet, with regard to the other occasion 
alluded to by Tertullian as having occurred prior to his 
banishment, the occasion of his having been thrown into 
flaming oil (for they understand this in a literal sense), 
there is, they pretend, mediaeval evidence sufficient of 
this having occurred at Rome, and this they think is 
what Tertullian in this passage says took place there.- 
But the slightest reflection — the very structure of the 
sentence, disproves that argument. For it is not " the 
church where John's alleged immersion took place prior 
to his banishment," but " the church where his banish- 
ment took place subsequent to his alleged immersion," 
that is in question. Any locality that is supposed to be 
conveyed in the term " church," is strictly confined to 
the banishment only. Yet even if this were not so, — 
even if the supposed immersion in the flaming oil were in- 
cluded with the banishment in the reference to the Roman 
church, — this leaves the above remarks untouched ; for, 
whatever else may have taken place, if John's banish- 
ment can be said to have taken place in the Roman 
church, Peter's crucifixion at Babylon may equally be 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 107 

said to have taken place in it. All this is so very plain, 
that few, I think, of the more enlightened of the Roman 
clergy will now-a-days rely on such an argument for 
refuting the indications that the Scriptures give us re- 
specting the place of Peter's martyrdom. They will 
still, no doubt, believe that there is sufficient mediaeval 
evidence for thinking that John was thrown into the 
flaming oil in a literal sense, and that this happened (as 
the Pseudo-Prochorus, in the twelfth or thirteenth cen- 
tury, first relates) at Rome instead of Ephesus ; but they 
will not pretend to deny, that whatever else Tertullian 
says, he distinctly says " the church in which John was 
banished erom Ephesus to Patmos ;" and this is all 
that it is incumbent upon me to explain, for (as I have 
so often repeated) in the same sense in which John could 
be said to have been banished from Ephesus to Patmos 
in consequence of his fidelity to the Roman Christians, 
Peter may also be said to have been, in the same cause, 
crucified at Babylon. 

I am, nevertheless, unwilling to pass over without 
notice this mediaeval legend about John's alleged immer- 
sion in a tub of flaming oil, as I find an incredible 
amount of misconception existing as to what is said upon 
this subject in the fathers. Of its having, in a literal 
sense, occurred at all anywhere, we have no evidence of 
any kind, as Baronius reluctantly acknowledges, unless we 
regard the present passage as such, until the writings of 
the Pseudo-Prochorus in the middle ages ; for Jerome, in 
his memoirs of St. John, says nothing whatever about it, 
and only mentions it elsewhere as a metaphor of Tertul- 
lian 7 s, in illustration of Matt. xx. 32. None of the other 
Fathers ever mention it ; nor does Tertullian himself do so 
anywhere else, except in the passage now nnder considera- 
tion — a universal silence which, in the case of so eminent 
an apostle as St. John, and so extraordinary an occur- 
rence, can only be accounted for by the metaphorical 
nature of the statement. And as to its being at Rome 
instead of Ephesus that John was thrown into the 
flaming oil, there is not the slightest intimation of this 



108 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

in any of the Fathers, for Tertullian does not connect even 
the Roman church with the event, nor does Jerome when 
he repeats it ; nor is there any other kind of evidence at 
all upon the subject, until the fictitious narrative of 
Prochorus made its appearance, towards the end of the 
middle ages. This fact is also candidly acknowledged 
by Baronius, (a.d. 92, paragraphs 1 and 2,) and the 
following passages, taken from this narrative of Pro- 
chorus will show what the Roman clergy hold upon the 
subject, — it is given in the Bibliotheca Patrum, (vol. ii.) 
After saying that the proconsul of the Ephesians brought 
over John to Rome in chains, by the orders of Domitian, 
in consequence of complaints transmitted to the Emperor 
against him, all which matters are given in detail, Pro- 
chorus, who pretends to have been his companion the 
whole time, adds, (chap, xi.) — u After these things the 
Roman senate, with the proconsul and the people of 
Rome, sat together before the Latin Gate, and ordered 
a tub full of boiling (not flaming) oil to be brought, 
into which they threw the apostle, on the day before the 
nones of May." Then, after describing how he experi- 
enced not the slightest pain or martyrdom of any kind 
under this operation, and that, when he was taken out, 
though nearly ninety years of age, he appeared to be 
quite refreshed and invigorated by it, Prochorus pro- 
ceeds : " Then Domitian gave orders that the proconsul 
should not make any further attempts to torture John, 
but that he should take him back to his prison, in order 
to see what was best to be done with him." We are 
then informed that John had a vision, in which he was 
told, " You must go back again to Ephesus, for that 
city has still great need of you," &c. The narrative 
then proceeds thus : — " So we went again to live at 
Ephesus; and the rest of the idols were destroyed, and 
there was not a temple in Ephesus from which the abo- 
minations were not removed. These were some of the 
miracles performed at Ephesus by John, before he was 
sent into banishment, — ill-treated by the Jews, the 
Romans, and the Greeks, whom the devil thus excited 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 109 

against us. Then the pontiffs and authorities of the 
Ephesians sent another letter to Domitian as follows: — 
4 The inhabitants of Ephesus to Domitian, the sovereign 
of the world, — We beg of you to assist us. Certain 
persons, who have come here from Judaea, named John 
and Prochorus, have taken possession of our city, dis- 
seminating a new doctrine, and destroying by their 
witchcrafts the temples of the gods. We acquaint you 
with these things, in order to comply with your wish 
respecting them, for you are our Emperor.' When the 
Emperor read this despatch, he gave orders that both the 
offenders should be banished from Ephesus, and wrote 
back as follows : — ' Domitian the Emperor to the autho- 
rities, and to the city of the Ephesians, — We wish those 
wicked impious wizards, John and Prochorus, to be 
banished, whom in our mercy we have endured too 
long. Therefore we order that they be banished to the 
Isle of Patmos,' &c. When this decree was brought to 
Ephesus, persons were sent to arrest us, I mean me, 
Prochorus, and St. John. Those who were sent were 
about one hundred, &c. At length they led us to the 
ship ; and, when we got on board, orders were given that 
we should be placed in the middle of the ship, and be 
allowed, as our provisions, six ounces of bread and a 
small vessel of water, and a little vinegar. St. John 
consumed two ounces of bread in the day, and one-eighth 
part of the water. He left the rest for me," &c. u There 
was afterwards a dance on board," &c. 

Thus it is evident, that John's being at Eome when he 
was banished to Patmos, is no part of the Roman legend 
on this subject, even in the absurdest writers ; for 
although the Roman clergy accept the account given of 
St. John in these fictitious writings of Prochorus, they 
nevertheless frankly enough acknowledge that these 
writings are fictitious, and cannot be regarded as good 
authority, either of his having been at Rome, or of any 
particular respecting that supposed event. The Abbe 
Rohrbacher evidently considered them not entitled to 
the least attention. In his " Universal History of the 



110 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

Church," (vol. iv. p. 490,) he says: — "We are not told 
in what year, nor in what way, nor for what purpose, 
the apostle John should have come to Rome, when he 
was so very old." 

Father Tillemont (a.d. 1650) says, — " The narrative 
of Prochorus is full of ridiculous fictions, and is supposed 
to have been written only about 300 years ago." 

Cardinal Baronius says, — " The writer of this narra- 
tive is proved to have, in many cases, written the grossest 
falsehoods," (in multis mendacissimus fuisse convincitur, 
a.d. 92, paragraph 1.) 

Father Ceillier says, — " The two books that we have 
under the name of St. Linus, about the martyrdoms of 
St. Peter and St. Paul, and the life of St. John, supposed 
to have been written by Prochorus, one of the seven 
first deacons, (Acts vi. 5,) are compositions full of 
absurd inventions, which are not even worth being 
read." 

The Benedictine fathers, in their Bibliotheque Sacree, 
say : " We have a history of St. John the Evangelist, 
supposed to have been written by the Deacon Prochorus. 
But it is evidently a modern composition, and full of 
fabulous anecdotes, unworthy of the deacon whose name 
it bears." 

I majr mention here, that all the fathers speak of John's 
banishment, whether it was a voluntary one or other- 
wise, as his martyrdom, and that they constantly speak 
of him as a martyr in allusion to it ; yet that by some 
singular mistake, the Roman clergy speak of his martyr- 
dom as having taken place in this ecclesiastical miracle, 
although the}^ tell us that he was so far from suffering 
either in mind or body during its performance, that he 
seemed to have been in every way greatly refreshed 
by it. 

But to return. As I have said, our present question 
respecting John exclusively concerns his banishment 
from Ephesus, as Tertullian is supposed to have said that 
this took place with reference to the Roman church in 
the same sort of way as Peter's crucifixion at Babylon 
might be said to have taken place with reference to the 



THE ANTENICENE RECOEDS. Ill 

same church ; and the attentive reader will see, from the 
facts to which his attention has been drawn, that there 
is not the slightest room for inferring from Tertullian's 
passage, even as the Roman clergy understand it, that 
Peter's death did not take place, as the Scriptures inti- 
mate, at Babylon. There is even another sense in which 
this highly figurative writer might have used the words 
in question, still supposing, as the Roman clergy pretend, 
that he does not here mean by " ecclesia " a community 
or persons, but some locality from which these derive 
their name. Whatever was done by the Roman govern- 
ment was constantly said to have been done at Rome, 
whether it was the union of separate provinces, the re- 
storation of dethroned princes, or any other act of govern- 
ment. I merely advert thus little to this sense, because 
although a vevj common one, it would involve too much 
unnecessary illustration here. According to it, however, 
Tertullian might have said that John was banished at 
Rome and Peter martyred there, as well as Paul be- 
headed within the ver}^ walls of that city. But are the 
Roman clergy prepared to show that Tertullian is in 
this passage speaking of the Roman church at all ? Who- 
ever will be at the pains of reading the treatise in the 
original, will, I think, see that he is not ; or, that this 
is at the least a very doubtful matter, and that there 
is quite as much, if not more, reason to suppose that he 
is speaking of the whole Christian church in contradis- 
tinction to the heretics, saying that she had martyrs to 
prove the truth of what she taught — a happiness of 
which the heretics could not boast — that the local 
church of Alexandria, his own church of Carthage, and 
all the other African local churches, were in harmony 
with her, and that the heresies which sprang from this 
universal church of the apostles and the martyrs, were 
no more to be in any way identified with her than the 
wild fig-tree with the cultivated fig-tree, which, amidst 
the mysteries of nature, sprang often both from the same 
seed. The whole treatise is against the heretics of those 
times, and one of the main arguments which recurs in 
every page is the disunion of these heretics on the one 



112 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

hand, and the universal oneness of the church of the 
apostles on the other. In chapter xx. he describes the 
foundation of this church in all its different localities, 
citing it as the first act of the apostles (stated in their 
"Acts," by St. Luke), and often insists that but one 
church was then founded by the apostles everywhere. 
" All these local bodies," says he, " great and many as 
they were, constituted that one first church founded by 
the apostles, to which one they all belonged. So that 
they were all the first church, and all apostolical, because 
they were all one church (omnes prima — una omnes) ; 
and this oneness of all these societies is proved by the 
peace, the brotherhood, the harmony of intercourse that 
reigns among them, which conditions arise from nothing 
else but the singleness of their faith." In chapters xxi. 
xxii. and xxiii. he reiterates this oneness of Christ's 
church, and for the first time in the treatise mentions 
John, and Paul, and Peter as joint agents in the building 
of it, dwelling also upon the too often forgotten fact that 
Peter's special mission was to the most Jewish districts of 
the earth (Petrus in circumcisionem ; Paulus in nationes). 
This oneness of " the church" is argued in every variety 
of forms to the last page of the treatise ; nor is the term 
" church" ever once used without some qualifying words, 
except when speaking of this one universal church. In 
chapter xxxiii. Tertullian points out how the church 
under the apostles foretold and denounced the heresies, 
and here again he names its three great martyrs and 
apostles. Paul, he says, denounced those who, like 
Marcion and Apelles, denied the resurrection ( 1 Cor. xv. 
12), and discouraged marriage (1 Tim. iv. 3). John, 
he says, denounced those who, like Marcion, " eat things 
sacrificed to idols" (Rev. ii. 14), or, like Hebion, denied 
that Christ had " come in the flesh." And Peter, he 
adds, condemned the worship of the angels, which was 
among the tenets of the Gnostics. In chapter xxxiv. he 
again adverts to the church as it existed under the 
apostles, saying that it not only condemned what it 
named, but still more what it left unnamed, as these 



TH3 ANTENICENE RECORDS. 113 

were still later heresies, and " so much the more corrupt," 
he says, " as not being even named by the apostles." In 
chapters xxxv. and xxxvi. he again speaks of this uni- 
versal church as the anti-heretical church, saying that it 
was the true one because it was the first ; and that it was 
the church of the apostles because it had their sanction 
while they lived, and now the sanction of those local 
bodies in which the chairs of the apostles were, i.e. (as 
he says, chapter xxxii.), the chairs in which the first 
bishops were men ordained and sent by the apostles. He 
then enumerates some of these localities, which naturally 
remind him of the three apostles he so often mentioned 
before — Rome, Philippi, &c, of Paul; Ephesus, of John; 
and all, of Peter, for it was by his orations that the 
apostles founded the church in most of these localities. 
He finally exclaims, " Happy church, to which the great 
apostles gave both their doctrine and their lives," &c, 
adding, that from this universal church of Christ the 
heresies came forth, as in nature it sometimes happened 
that what was impure sprang from what was pure. This 
is the context; the following is a literal translation of 
that portion of the context immediately adjoining the 
present passage. " Our system — the doctrine of our 
church (nostra disciplina — nostra res) is not of a later 
date than theirs (the heretics') — nay, it is earlier, it is 
before them all. And that is the proof that it is the 
true church, for in such cases truth is always first, 
and the apostles not only did not denounce it, they 
defended it, and this is our proof that what we now 
have was theirs. For the church that the apostles did 
not condemn, as they condemned all that was not 
theirs, is thereby proved to be their own, and to have 
the sanction of their teaching and their blood. 
Refer to some of the apostolic localities, you who may 
wish to employ your curiosity to your advantage in the 
cause of your redemption, and you will see that it is as 
I tell you. Go to the cities in which the very chairs 
which the apostles founded are still occupied as they 
were, in which the very letters that they wrote are still 
publicly read from authentic copies, conveying to us as 

i 



114 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

it were the very -sound of their voice, the very expres- 
sion of their features. There are plenty of these places. 
If you live next Achaia, you have the city of Corinth to 
go to ; if near Macedonia, you have the town of Philippi 
and you have Thessalonica ; if you can go so far eastward 
as Asia Minor, you have the advantage of Ephesus ; and 
if you live near Italy, you have the city of Kome, whither 
we also send up our appeals. Yes, happy — truly happy, 
is that church, into which with their lives the apostles 
poured forth all their doctrine ; in which Peter and his 
divine Master both suffered the same death — in which 
Paul, like the Baptist, is beheaded — in which St. John 
the Evangelist is banished from Ephesus to Patmos (after 
coming forth unhurt from the flaming oil). Let us con- 
sider what she has learned from the apostles, what she 
has taught to us. She recognises but one God, the Cre- 
ator of the universe, and Jesus Christ his Son, born of 
the Virgin Mary ; she recognises also the resurrection of 
the dead ; she unites the law and the prophets with the 
writings of the evangelists and of the apostles. From 
them she learns what she believes; and this she seals 
with baptism — this she clothes with the Holy Spirit — 
this she sustains with the Eucharist. She exhorts all to 
steadfastness in the trials of their faith, and receives 
no one who conforms not to this teaching. Such is the 
church which not only foretold the heresies, but out of 
which the heresies proceeded. They did not, however, 
belong to her, inasmuch as they set themselves in array 
against her. From the nut of the cultivated olive the 
wild olive springs ; from the seed of the most delicious 
fig the empty and useless wild fig rises : and thus the 
heresies have grown out of our church. They grew 
from our fruit, yet not of the same kind as we are ; from 
the seed of truth, indeed, but untrue and wild. In order, 
then, that the truth of our principles should be seen, 
which are those that the church has handed down from 
the apostles, the apostles from Christ, and Christ from 
God, heretics must not be allowed to appeal to scripture, 
as without scripture we can prove that they have no 
right to appeal to it." 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 115 

It cannot appear to any one so very evident that all 
this applies to the local church of Rome. To many it 
must be evident, for various reasons, that it does not. 
No one, for instance, has pretended that it was at Rome 
that the heresies here condemned by Tertullian took their 
rise; and the Roman clergy show that they also have 
their misgivings; for they introduce the word " Rome" 
or " Roman" in the passage where it is not in the 
original, in order to fasten this sense upon the words. I 
do not here argue that Tertullian shows clearly what 
church he speaks of, though I think he does ; I only say 
that he leaves that point so uncertain as to render the 
apostrophe, "Happy church," &c, unavailable as evidence 
of Peter's not having died in the city whence he wrote his 
letters to the provinces of the Dispersion, even if that 
apostrophe would in any case have proved it, which, 
however, I have shown that it would not. 

The other two passages, adduced from Tertullian's 
writings, afford no statement whatever — not even a me- 
taphorical one — upon the subject of our inquiry, and 
have been supposed to do so only from the preconceived 
notions of those who cite them. In one of them it is 
said that our Lord's prediction respecting Peter's cruci- 
fixion was fulfilled, as every one admits, at the period when 
the first Roman persecution was being carried on (a per- 
secution which we have already seen extended over the 
whole empire), and some writers look upon this as a sort 
of argument for supposing that it was fulfilled at the same 
place as the persecution originated. Tertullian's words 
run thus : — " We read the lives of the emperors. Nero 
was the first at Rome who dyed with blood the infant 
faith of Christendom. It was at that period that Peter 
' was bound by another,' for he was then fastened to the 
cross. It was at that period also that Paul really became 
a citizen of Rome, for it was at Rome that his martyr- 
dom — that second noble birth — took place." (Scorpiacum, 
c. 15.) Here we are not told that Peter became a citizen 
of Rome. Rome is not named as the scene of his martyr- 
dom, although it is as that of Paul's ; and although this 

i2 



116 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

was a case in which, for the sake of clearness, it would, if 
possible, have been so named, as Tertullian alludes here 
to the prediction mentioned by Peter in his letter from 
Babylon, upon that very subject. This passage will 
remind the reader of that in Clemens Romanus, where 
also Rome is mentioned as the scene of only one of the 
two martyrdoms. 

In the other passage Tertullian merely says, " The 
Romans — to whom Peter and Paul left the gospel sealed 
with their blood." (Adv. Marcion. c. 6.) Is it, I ask, 
pretended that they did not leave the gospel so sealed to 
all other churches also? If all the Roman clergy were 
thoroughly convinced that Peter was crucified at Babylon, 
as his own words and our Lord's words so plainly inti- 
mate, would they not still consider it to be true, that he 
who had founded the church of Rome bequeathed the 
gospel to it sealed with his blood? Is there not some- 
thing frivolous in inferring from such a statement that 
the scriptural intimations are not to be depended upon, 
and that after what Tertullian says, it cannot be supposed 
that Peter could possibly have undergone his martyrdom 
at Babylon ? 

XXII. 

St. Cyprian (about a.d. 250), bishop of Carthage, speaks 
of the church at Rome as " Peter's chair;" and this, 
which all admit to be all that he says of Peter in connexion 
with Rome, is looked upon as one of the most conclusive 
proofs that we have of the apostle's having left the East. 
That it is, however, not the slightest proof, or even in- 
timation of this, is evident from the fact, that churches 
in places where Peter can be proved never to have been, 
and where it is allowed on all hands that he never was, 
are also called " Peter's chairs." St. Optatus, the bishop 
of Milevis, in Numidia, calls his small church of Milevis, 
<c Peter's chair." (ii. 5. 9.) The church of Carthage, St. 
Cyprian's own church, some hundred miles distant from 
Milevis, is likewise called so by this same writer, (i. 10.) 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 117 

Alexandria is called " Peter's chair" by St. Gregory the 
First, in his letter to Eulogius, one of its archbishops, 
(book vi. epist. 40,) and Hippo, St. Augustine's little 
church, on the African coast, is spoken of by St. Augus- 
tine as the chair of Peter, (lib. ii. contra literas Petiliani, 
c. 51.) Yet none of these writers, nor any other writer, 
Roman-catholic or Protestant, pretends that Peter was 
either at Mile vis or at Carthage, at Alexandria or at 
Hippo. Even the remote church of England was called 
" Peter's chair" by St. Gildas, two or three centuries 
after Cyprian's time, yet no modern Roman Catholic 
affects thence to infer that Peter must have been to Can- 
terbury. " Britain has her priests," says St. Gildas, 
(born a.d. 511,) in his epistle " On the Destruction of 
Britain," " but they are foolish; they sit in Peter's 
chair with unwashed feet, but fall into the place that 
more becomes them, the chair of the traitor Judas." 
(Script. Brit. p. 23.) Nor does the Roman church object 
to other churches being called " Peter's chairs." " It is 
justly," says the celebrated Aubespine, bishop of Orleans, 
in 1600 — " It is justly that Optatus calls Carthage 
4 Peter's chair,' because, as Tertullian expresses it, it 
was begotten by St. Peter." (Quia Petrus earn genuit, 
ut loquitur Tertullianus. Albaspinceus in Optat.) And 
again, " In the church there is but one chair, which 
Christ gave to Peter, and which Peter has given to every 
bishop. This is what all the ancient writers teach us. 
It is not without good reason, therefore, that the chair of 
Carthage was called Peter's chair." {Ibid.) The Bene- 
dictine editors, also, of St. Gregory's works, say that 
" St. Peter's chair at Alexandria and St. Peter's chair at 
Rome was one and the same chair, belonging to one and 
the same apostle." (Unius esse atque unam. in loc. supra 
citat.) We find, in like manner, that "the chair of 
Moses," (cathedra Moysi) cited as a similar and expla- 
natory expression by St. Augustine, was at Jerusalem, 
where Moses himself never was ; and that the chair at 
Rome was also called " the chair of Christ," (Cathedra 
Christi ;) and " the chair placed by our Lord at Rome," 



118 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

(cathedra quam Roma? Christus constituerat. Aubespine 
on Optatus,) although we know that our Lord when on 
earth was not at Rome. Peter's chair, therefore, being 
in Europe, is no more a sign of Peter's having left the 
East, than our Lord's chair being at Carthage or Rome is a 
reason for thinking that our Lord went to either of those 
cities, or that the chair of Moses being at Jerusalem is a 
sign that Moses himself must have been in the capital of 
Judaea. 

Although this is all that we are here called upon to 
prove, yet as some of the less informed of the Roman 
clergy think, and lead others to think, that what Cyprian 
means by this expression is a chair which had been 
made at Rome by a joiner there, (not sent over, as some 
might imagine, by the apostle after he had been sitting 
in it at Babylon or Jerusalem, but which had never 
been outside the walls of Rome); and that Peter's 
having sat in a chair of this description is the clearest 
proof that he must have left the East; — as some, I say, 
of the less informed of the Roman clergy sometimes 
mention this wooden chair in their tracts, as the chair 
alluded to by St. Cyprian, the two or three following 
quotations from the fathers and the more enlightened 
of the Roman clergy will exhibit the preposterous cha- 
racter of this delusion and the true interpretation of the 
term " chair" in these expressions. 

St. Jerome tells us distinctly, that in all such expres- 
sions, the word " chair" means doctrine or authority 
to teach. Per Cathedram — doctrinam debemus acci- 
pere. (Commentary on Matthew, book 4.) And this 
figurative sense of the term is the only one that was pre- 
tended to by any of the writers of the Roman church 
until they become involved in the present controversy. 

" Peter's chair, or the episcopal seat," says Father 
Dupin, " is the supreme authority of ruling the laity by 
the power of the priesthood." (Cathedra est auctoritas 
regendse plebis vi Episcopatus. Commentary upon 
Optatus.) 

" The chair of the scorner," and "the chair of the 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 119 

traitor Judas," are often introduced by the fathers, as 
may be seen in the quotations from St. Gildas, St. 
Augustine, and others, to exemplify this use of the term 
"chair," to denote doctrine or authority; and in the 
same way " the chair of Moses" is and has always been 
understood. " By the chair of Moses," says Father 
Calmet (on Matthew xxiii.), "is here signified either his 
doctrine or his authority." And again, in his "Dictionary 
of the Bible:" "The chair of Moses expresses the au- 
thority of the doctors of the law, and their office of 
teaching." The Dominican fathers also, in their Biblio- 
theque Sacree, say, " The chair of Moses means the 
authority to teach." 

Accordingly, Tertullian, as it has been seen, considered 
that Peter's chair admitted of being generated (Petrus 
earn genuit. in loc. supra cit.) The bishop of Orleans 
also looked upon it in this remarkable light, and con- 
sidered that it admitted of being multiplied ad infinitum. 
(Propagatae et genitae Cathedrae, not in Opt.) What 
in the name of common sense can such expressions have 
to do with a wooden chair at Kome? 

But that Cyprian himself did not mean by " Peter's 
chair" any particular wooden chair, either sent into 
Europe by Peter from Babylon, or in which the apostle 
literally sat dozen, but only any local church in which 
his doctrine was taught and his authority exercised, is 
clearly proved by St. Cyprian's own unequivocal ex- 
planation of his own expression as " the chair that 
rested upon — that was founded upon St. Peter." (Ca- 
thedra super Petrum fundata. Epist. 40.) 

It may seem frivolous to have taken up so much 
space with a matter so obvious, and once so universally 
admitted; yet now-a-days, as the fate of the Papal 
power is found to depend upon Peter's having left the 
East, this calling the Roman church, or something in it, 
" Peter's chair," is one of the straws laid hold on by the 
clergy — one of the most incontrovertible proofs they tell 
us that they can find, or that we ought to require, of 
that great ecclesiastical supposition. 



120 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 



XXIII. 

St. Firmilian, (about a.d. 250) bishop of Csesarea, 
one of the churches which were founded by Peter in 
Cappadocia, at the same time as he founded the church 
at Babylon and the church at Rome, says in a very 
indignant letter to Cyprian, that Stephen, the bishop of 
Eome, endeavoured to persuade people that he had 
Peter's succession in his church of Rome quite as much 
as Firmilian himself had in Cappadocia, or as Cyprian 
had at Carthage : yet that this Stephen was not acting 
up to these pretensions; nay, that, on the contrary, he 
was a fool and a heretic. 

From this it is inferred by Baratier, the Correspondent 
in the Times, and others, that Peter must have been at 
Rome, as " Peter's succession" could only be in some 
town where Peter was. St. Firmilian wrote as follows : 
" I have good reason to be indignant at the arrant folly 
of this bishop Stephen, — that he who boasts so much of 
the city in which he is bishop, and pretends (contendit) 
that he is one of those who have the succession of Peter, 
upon whom the foundations of the whole church are 
placed, — that he should bring in several other rocks 
beside Peter, and build several other churches beside 
that of Christ." Of the inference which it is attempted 
to draw from these words, there is abundant refutation 
in the single well known fact that Irenaeus, bishop of 
Lyons, in France, a writer of great piety and eminence, 
spoke of himself as possessing at Lyons " the succession 
of the apostles," although it is known that the apostles 
never were at Lyons, nor even one of them for a single 
hour. " The work about the number Eight," says Eu- 
sebius, (v. 20,) " was also written by Irenaeus; and in it 
he informs us that he had received the first succession 
of the apostles." Clemens, the bishop of Alexandria, 
who lived about the same time as Irenaeus, makes a 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 121 

similar statement about himself, in almost the same lan- 
guage. " In his first book," says Eusebius, (vi. 13,) 
" Clemens tells us that he was one of the first in the 
succession of the apostles." And yet no Roman- 
catholic writer pretends that any of the apostles were 
at Alexandria. How, then, can any one suppose that 
Stephen's being said to have Peter's succession proves 
Peter to have been in Europe? 

But I cannot forbear mentioning four other con- 
siderations which set this matter in quite as clear a 
light as the cases of Irenaeus and Clemens, and which 
may serve to show how totally common sense has been 
outraged by these struggles to prove that Peter left the 
East. 1st. What could be more natural than that the 
line of bishops in every church founded by Peter and 
the apostles should call themselves " the bishops of 
Peter and the apostles," or simply " the apostles' suc- 
cession of bishops," or "Peter's succession of bishops;" 
and this, even if neither Peter nor the apostles had ever 
been within their town? 2ndly. Would not such an 
expression be, if possible, still more appropriate and 
still more natural, in the case of a church to which Peter 
had himself sent one of its first bishops, — which is what 
it seems highly probable that Peter did for the church 
at Rome, and what all the Roman- catholic writers affirm 
that Peter really did do for that church? Would not 
those who succeeded this bishop be most truly " Peter's 
succession," without Peter's having ever left the East? 
3rdly. The very passage quoted from St. Firmilian is so 
far from saying that Stephen really had Peter's succes- 
sion, (as some have been led to think,) that Firmilian 
therein pretty distinctly intimates that he had it not ; 
that his pretensions to it were not allowed; that he had 
at least some difficulty in enforcing them; that his con- 
duct was incompatible with it, inasmuch as he was in- 
troducing strange rocks under the foundations of the 
church, and that he was no longer entitled to be spoken of 
with the respect that was due from one of Peter's bishops 
to another. But, 4thly, over and above each of these con- 



122 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

siderations, what can be more plain or conclusive upon 
this point (even if we had nothing else to guide us) 
than St. Firmilian's own explanation of the phrase, 
" Peter's succession," when, on again requiring to ad- 
vert to this a few lines afterwards, and to the unreason- 
ableness of Stephen's pretensions respecting it, he says, 
" Stephen, who gives out that he has by succession the 
chair of Peter"? It is evident from this expression 
alone, that " Peter's succession," as Firmilian under- 
stood it, was not confined to the cities in which Peter 
had resided, any more than Peter's chair was confined 
to them; and that therefore the church at Rome, being 
one of those that had his succession in Firmilian's sense, 
would be no proof, nor even the smallest sign, of his 
having been in Europe. As on former occasions, I indi- 
cate sundry reasons why the words do not prove what 
they are brought to prove. What I have mentioned, 
however, of Clemens and Irenseus, supersedes all else upon 
the present passage. 



XXIY. 

St. Stephen, bishop of Rome, (about a.d. 250,) does 
not say one word upon the supposed visit of Peter to 
Europe ; and is merely introduced to augment the ap- 
parent " cloud of witnesses" respecting this supposed 
visit, on the ground, that it is to be presumed, from what 
Firmilian says, that Stephen really did pretend that he 
had Peter's succession as well as any one else, however 
much the bishops of other churches might dispute his 
having it ; and that therefore he also considered the sup- 
posed visit to have taken place. But it is clear that this 
Roman bishop having set up a disputed claim to what 
was called Peter's succession, does not by any means 
prove that his claim was a well-founded one ; and equally 
clear, from what has been said in the last chapter, that 
even if this Roman bishop had that " Peter's succession" 
to which he pretended, this would not prove Peter to 
have ever been in Europe. 



THE ANTENICENE KEC0KDS. 123 



XXV. 



Okigen, (a.d. 254,) an ecclesiastical writer of Alexan- 
dria, is one of the authorities most depended upon by the 
Koman clergy, for showing that the scriptural account 
of Peter's martyrdom, as having occurred when he was 
at Babylon, is not to be relied on. But Origen does not 
say one word to this effect. Eusebius, as it will be seen 
later, mentions, (ii. 25, and iii. 31,) what we learn 
also from other more recent sources, that some relics 
found in the catacombs in his day at Rome, were sup- 
posed to be those of Peter; and is thence led to con- 
jecture that perhaps this apostle was transferred from 
Babylon to Europe to be put to death, just in the same 
loose way as he conjectures from Peter's having written 
to the Jews of Bithynia, that he might perhaps have 
lived among them. The Roman clergy have imagined 
that Origen is described by Eusebius, on this occa- 
sion, as having been the author of this conjecture 
about the relics. But Origen, as will be seen, says 
nothing about it, nor does Eusebius say he does. This 
is now admitted by Valesius, the Roman-catholic com- 
mentator on Eusebius, and by Father De la Rue, the 
Benedictine editor of Origen' s works, although the latter 
has inadvertently inserted the whole chapter from Euse- 
bius as a portion of what Origen had written. The 
mistake, which seems to have begun with Baronius, even 
the English reader can judge of. Eusebius, who wrote 
in the fourth century, tells us (iii. 1), that there was in 
his day a tradition, or unauthenticated rumour, respect- 
ing such particulars of Thomas, Andrew, and John, as 
are not recorded in the Scripture: that for what is 
not there recorded of Peter we were limited to mere 
conjecture ; but that there was the plain statement of 
Origen to go upon respecting Paul. What is here said 
of Paul, Baronius and most of the Roman clergy have 
confounded with what is said of Peter. The passage in 
Eusebius is as follows : — " The holy apostles and disciples 
of our Lord having been scattered over the whole world, 



124 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

Thomas, according to tradition, (7rapa<Wc,) received 
Parthia (in which Babylon was not included in the time 
of Eusebius) as his allotted region; Andrew, Scythia; 
and John, Asia Minor ; where, after continuing for some 
time, he died at Ephesus. There is some reason to think 
(cockc), that Peter went to Pontus and Galatia and 
Bithynia, to Cappadocia and Asia Minor, while he was 
proclaiming the gospel to the Jews of the Dispersion, 
and that he was afterwards at Eome, when he was 
crucified with his head downwards, which was the way 
in which he himself understood he was to suffer. What 
need is there that we should tell where Paul went 
when spreading the gospel of Christ from Jerusalem 
to Illyria, and that he finally suffered martyrdom at 
Rome in the reign of Nero ? These things are distinctly 
asserted (aa^wg uprjrai) by Origen." The mistake into 
which Baronius fell was, that he confounded what Origen 
''distinctly asserted" with what Eusebius states as a 
conjecture. Some of the earlier critics supposed that 
the words " These things are distinctly asserted by 
Origen," referred to all the previous clauses, beginning at 
" the holy apostles," although they so obviously apply 
to the last only. Many of the moderns extend them to 
the clause respecting Peter. But Valesius frankly ac- 
knowledges that Eusebius does not tell us that Origen 
attested what is said about St. Peter, though Valesius 
himself seems to assume that Origen may have done so. 
" Eusebius," says he, " has not clearly pointed out what 
is the commencement of Origen's words ;" which remark 
Father De la Rue repeats in his edition of Origen. Both 
these writers, therefore, admit that we cannot infer from 
what Eusebius says, that Origen had ever heard of the 
conjecture that contradicts the scriptural account of 
Peter's martyrdom at Babylon. 

The whole of Valesius' s note is as follows : — " Cum 
Eusebius hie dicat superiora ex libro Origenis esse 
desumpta, dubitari merito potest unde incipiant 
Origenis verba ; an a vocibus illis Ow^uac pev an potius ab 
istis rhrpoc Sc. Neque enim Eusebius satis distincte 
nobis notavit quodnam esset initium Origenis verborum." 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 125 

Valesius here speaks of Origen's words; but no one 
pretends to produce any thing in Origen's own words 
upon this subject. 

XXVI. 

Petrus Alexandrinus, (a.d. 311,) archbishop of Alex- 
andria, is supposed to have heard that Peter's martyrdom 
did not take place at Babylon, but at Kome, because 
there is a work now extant, " On Penance," in which a 
statement is made to this effect, and which work was 
once attributed to this archbishop. That this produc- 
tion, however, is of a much later date, and not his, is 
evident from two facts connected with it, and universally 
admitted by the Roman clergy, although they still con- 
tinue to publish the work under his name. One of these 
facts is, that a portion of this work is discovered to have 
been taken, word for word, from another work, called a 
" Discourse on Easter," also attributed, until very lately, 
to this archbishop. Of this portion of the work on 
Penance, the Dominican Fathers, in their Bibliotheque 
Sacr^e, observe : "It is nothing more than a passage 
taken from a discourse, written by Peter of Alexandria, 
about the feast of Easter." The discovery here stated 
was first made by Zonaras, a monk of Constantinople, in 
the eleventh century; and as long as the " Discourse on 
Easter" was considered to have been written by Petrus 
Alexandrinus, the authenticity of the work on Penance 
not only remained also undisputed, but was even looked 
upon as confirmed by this discovery. At length, how- 
ever, a new fact turned up. The " Discourse on Easter" 
was discovered, by the Roman Catholics themselves, and 
by the librarians of the Vatican, to be of a date long 
subsequent to the times of this archbishop, extending at 
least to a.d. 451. The discovery I now speak of was 
made in this way: — A MS. with another portion of the 
" Discourse on Easter," that had not yet made its appear- 
ance, was found, not very long ago, in the Vatican 
library, some particulars respecting which are given by 
Father du Fresne, in his edition of the Paschalion, or 



126 THE ANTENICENE REC0KDS. 

Chronicon Paschale, (Paris, 1688,) a very slight inspec- 
tion of which MS. at once convinced all who saw it, and 
none more than the Roman clergy themselves, that the 
" Discourse on Easter" attributed to the archbishop of 
Alexandria, was written after the Council of Chalcedon, 
(a.d. 451, ) and therefore not by him. Of the " Discourse 
on Easter" thus completed, Father Ceillier says : " A Dis- 
course on Easter, in the form of a dialogue, and printed 
in the beginning of the Alexandrian Chronicle, is attri- 
buted to Petrus Alexandrinus ; but there is no room for 
doubt (mais on ne peut douter) that this is the work of 

a much more recent writer He did not live until 

after the Councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon." (Ceill. 
vol. iv., Petr. Alex.) In a matter universally admitted 
as this is by the Roman clergy, it is unnecessary to load 
the statement with their opinions. It naturally follows 
from these two facts, that the work on Penance, which 
was to some extent compiled from the " Discourse on 
Easter," was at least of as late a date as that Discourse, 
and was therefore erroneously attributed, as it was 
during some centuries, to Petrus Alexandrinus. 

In addition, however, to this irrefragable proof of the 
late period at which the work on Penance was written, 
I may observe, that there is no trace of the existence of 
this work at all until the Council of Constantinople, com- 
monly called the Trullan Council, at the close of the 
seventh century, by which council the orthodoxy of the 
work was examined into and acknowledged, but without 
the least reference whatever to its authenticity ; and that 
the original MS. title of this work on Penance, as pre- 
sented to the Trullan Council, does not by any means 
describe it as the production of Petrus Alexandrinus, 
but only as having been compiled from a treatise im- 
puted to him, " On those who Fall Away in Times of 
Persecution, and then Repent." The rules of penance 
introduced in this treatise are thus professedly set down 
afresh by some unknown person, who wrote between the 
Council of Chalcedon, a.d. 451, and the Trullan Council, 
a.d. 692. The title under which the work was examined 
by the latter council is as follows: — "Regulations intro- 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 127 

duced by Peter the Martyr, and archbishop of Alex- 
andria, in his work on Penance, called 4 Those who 
Fall Away in Times of Persecution, and then Repent.' " 
Thus, in no way that we approach this document is there 
a shadow of pretext for saying that Petrus Alexandrinus 
had ever heard that the apostle Peter was not put to 
death at Babylon. 



XXVII. 

Arnobius, (about a.d. 330,) a pagan convert, and 
African writer of great eloquence, is supposed to have 
heard that Peter had been in Europe some twenty or 
thirty years before he was put to death at Babylon. 
The only ground that the Roman clergy assign for this 
supposition is, that in one of his enthusiastic addresses 
to the pagan world on behalf of his new faith, after 
alluding to its diffusion in the most distant countries, in 
our own Islands, in Egypt, in Cappadocia, and at Babylon, 
immediately on the first teaching of the apostles, he adds 
the Romans as a remarkable instance of conversion. 
" They hesitated not," says he, " to join the faith on that 
occasion ; for they had seen the fiery steeds of the Magi- 
cian scattered by the breath of Peter, (ore Petri,) and 
vanish at the name of Christ." On this passage the 
Roman clergy rely, as affording the clearest indication 
possible that Arnobius must have been under the im- 
pression that Peter came into Europe before he employed 
himself in the mission appointed for him by our Lord. 
But there is nothing of this kind implied in these words. 
" To see a thing happen," is an expression which we 
constantly apply to things which occur at the greatest 
distance from us. For instance, if it is said of English- 
men, " They have seen the Pope banished from his do- 
minions : they have seen him restored by the bayonets 
of the President," this does not imply, either that there 
were Englishmen present at Rome or Naples at the time, 
nor that it was in England that the Pope took refuge 3 
nor that Louis Napoleon went to Rome. The Romans, 



128 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

we are told, saw that the thing happened. It is mere 
sophistry to argue from such an expression that the 
thing must have happened at Rome. But, besides this, 
even if we must give the "had seen" of this passage a 
strictly literal sense, there were Romans of all classes 
scattered in great numbers throughout the East, and 
Arnobius gives us to understand that the thing happened 
before the apostles left Jerusalem, mentioning, moreover, 
the name of a town, apparently in connexion with the 
story, which is not known as having ever been the 
name of any European town. The whole passage is as 
follows : — 

" Those miracles which were performed openly — that 
superhuman power which the Saviour exerted upon the 
natural world, made the Gentiles believe in Him, and made 
the most heterogeneous of the nations unite in that belief. 
For we can recount what happened, and it may be of 
use to you to hear; we can recount what happened — 
the churches that were founded — in~the far East, among 
the Persians and among the Medes; we can recount 
what was done in Asia Minor and in Syria, among the 
Galatians, among the Parthians, (who had Babylon in 
Peter's day,) and among the Phrygians; we can tell 
you what happened in Achaia, in Macedonia, in Epirus, 
aye, and in every island, every province, upon which the 
rising or the setting sun sheds light; and, finally, at 
Rome, the mistress of the world — even there men were 
found, who, although intent upon the ancient supersti- 
tions of their Numa, did not scruple to abandon the re- 
ligion of their country, and to become members of a 
Christian church; for they had seen the path of the 
Magician ; they had seen his fiery chariot and four fire- 
winged coursers scattered by the breath of Peter, (ore 
Petri,) and vanish at the name of Christ. Yes, they 
had seen one who was betrayed by the false gods to 
whom he trusted, and who, by falling headlong when 
they forsook him, broke both his legs, and lay thus upon 
the ground. And, at a subsequent period, they saw this 
same man, after he had been transferred to Brunda, 
worn out with his sufferings and his shame, fling himself 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 129 

down from the highest point of a roof, and die. But all 
these things ye neither know nor wish to know, nor 
think that it could ever be of any use to you to know 
them. The false gods ye trust to are your own hearts, " 
&c. (Lib. ii.) 

Now, when it is considered that Brunda was not the 
name of any European town that has ever been heard 
of — that the Roman church, whose foundation is here 
mentioned as subsequent to the apparition of the fiery 
equipage, was existing under Tiberius, and before the 
general exodus of the apostles from Judaea, (as has al- 
ready been shown from Tertullian, Eusebius, Orosius, 
and others, in the section on Irenaeus) and that Judaea, as 
well as the whole country from Judaea to Babylon, was, 
at this time, constantly occupied by the Roman legions, 
and full of other Romans of all descriptions, it will, I 
think, be admitted by all parties, that even if " had 
seen" is to be taken in its strictly literal sense, Arnobius 
not only sa} 7 s nothing to indicate Europe as the place 
where the fiery chariot was presented in mid-air to the 
eyes of the astonished Romans, but even seems to de- 
signate the East, in a very pointed manner, as the scene of 
that astonishment, which we are here told, led, as a proxi- 
mate cause, to the establishment of the Roman church. 
To which, it may be added, that none of the other 
Fathers, although they all considered this story as the 
most undisguised allegory, make any allusion to Rome 
as the scene of it. (See the sections on Cyril of Jeru- 
salem, Theodoret, &c.) 

I do not, it will be observed, raise any question in 
what I now say, as to whether the story of the fiery 
chariot, drawn, at a considerable elevation, by four wild 
horses winged with fire, at the mere word of an absurd 
impostor, was a pagan fable or an ecclesiastical miracle. 
What I now ask is, whether Arnobius states that it was 
in Europe that this took place? and on this point there 
is not the slightest room for any doubt. Arnobius does 
not say that it was there (wherever else it might have 
been), that the first Roman converts saw the chariot; 

K 



130 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

on the contrary, he very plainly gives us to understand 
that it was in Asia. 

But besides all this, even if Arnobius gave the story 
as a fact, not as an allegory, and added, in a distinct 
manner, that it was in Europe that the phenomenon had 
been seen, how could we infer from the expression, " by 
the breath of Peter," or " by the prayers of Peter," (ore 
Petri) that the apostle was in personal attendance on the 
occasion? Would it not be a very weak and degrading 
argument to say that this fiery equipage could not pos- 
sibly have been brought down by the prayers of the 
apostle Peter, unless he himself came from Babylon or 
Jerusalem, and was present on the spot ? I appeal to the 
conscientious Roman Catholic. Would there not be 
something bordering upon an impious and reckless levity 
in such a supposition ? If any satisfactory authority can 
be shown for believing this ecclesiastical miracle about 
the four horses with wings of fire, and the ascent of the 
enchanter into mid-air over Rome, towards heaven, in a 
chariot of flame from the top of the Capitoline hill, as the 
circumstances are usually described — if there be, I say, 
credible evidence for the literal reality of this trans- 
action, what need would there be that we should suppose 
Peter present in person to bring back the triumphant 
Samaritan to the earth by prayer? Might the apostle's 
prayers not have been successful from the greatest 
distance, even from the banks of the Euphrates, as well 
as if he had stood beneath the very chariot as it passed? 
Or might not the prayers of the Roman church be here 
called the prayers of Peter ? Will any one that is sincere 
pretend to say that the Christian church at Rome, of 
which Peter and the apostles at Jerusalem were the 
founders, might not be with perfect propriety designated 
the " breath of Peter," or " the prayers of Peter" on 
this occasion? Nay, was not that church, in fact and 
in truth, the voice of the apostles within the city of the 
Cassars? Might not the bishop that Peter sent to Rome 
— might not the twelve missionaries or evangelists, 
which some of the apocryphal records of the Roman 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 131 

church represent Simon Peter, the apostle, as having 
sent there from Cassarea after the impostor of Samaria — 
might not the document, called " Peter's proclamation," 
(to Krjpvy/uLa Ylerpov) which is known to have been pub- 
lished at Eome in the reign of Claudius, expressly 
against the Gnostics, have been a sufficient representative 
of the apostle at Rome, to justify Arnobius in saying 
that what these effected was effected by the M breath of 
Peter?" Tertullian tells us that verified copies of Peter's 
letters, and of those of the other apostles, were carefully 
preserved at all the apostolic churches, for the purpose 
of arresting heresy. Will any one undertake to say 
that, even if this story of the chariot is not an allegory, 
these letters alone were not that " breath of Peter" at 
Rome — that teaching of the apostles, by which the fiery 
steeds of the heretic were arrested and scattered as they 
passed in their mad career above the capitol? 

Thus, even if a literal sense be given to this passage, 
it affords not the slightest pretext for supposing that 
Peter was in Europe, or even that Arnobius thought 
he was. That the allegorical sense, however, is the 
only one that the statement will bear, is placed beyond 
all dispute by the unanimity of the Fathers on the sub- 
ject. Justin Martyr (a.d. 167), St. Irenseus (a.d. 200), 
and Tertullian, men of research, and the only writers who 
for the first three centuries speak of the impostor of 
Samaria as living at Rome, after having been first the 
greater part of his life in the East, say nothing whatever 
of his passing above the imperial city, at any time, in a 
fiery chariot, nor of Simon Peter's presence in Europe 
on that or any other occasion. It strikes me that this 
will always be looked upon as insuperable evidence 
against the literal interpretation of the passage in 
Arnobius, for if they did not consider the story an 
allegory they would have related it ; and when we add 
to this, that Eusebius (a.d. 340), the next writer, in 
the order of time, says not one word about this fiery 
chariot having ever been seen either in Europe or in 
Asia; and that he says that he relates in his history, 

k 2 



132 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

every, the smallest, particular that had come down to 
his own times about St. Peter, we have the clearest 
possible assurance from the Fathers that the Samaritan 
impostor did not drive, in any literal sense, these four 
fire-winged horses, either in the West or in the East ; 
and that, even if it could be shown from any other 
source that he did drive them, St. Peter was not per- 
sonally present when he did so. Cyril of Jerusalem, 
and the one or two other post-Nicene Fathers, who do 
speak of a Gnostic chariot, confirm this. For they not 
only do not make Europe the scene of it, nor represent 
the great apostle of the Jews on the occasion as present, 
otherwise than in his prayers, but, as may be seen in 
the sections on these writers, they speak of it as a mere 
allegory, with which each was at liberty to combine any 
fresh circumstances he might think proper. 

I have now to show that most of the Roman clergy have 
for a long time viewed this story in the same allegorical 
light as all the Fathers did, and as all Protestants have 
always done ; and that they have for centuries abandoned 
as utterly untenable the literal interpretation given to 
it by Father M c Corry, and the Correspondent in the 
Times. 

John Baptist Cotelier, one of the most learned doctors 
of the Sorbonne (a.d. 1686), says in his Notes upon the 
writings attributed to the early Fathers (Apost. Const. 
vi. 9): u No doubt you will ask me what we are to 
think of this amazing and much-talked-of downfal of the 
the Samaritan's chariot. I stick to the old proverb, — 
there is danger both in believing and in not believing. 
I neither maintain this story as a fact, nor do I positively 
reject it. I do what is called fTr^w, I suspend my 
judgment on the matter. Whoever has a fancy for 
miracles of this kind (cui cordi erunt ejusmodi miracula), 
and there are many who have, he has in this case the 
support of many great names, both in the Greek and 
Latin churches. But those who are more inclined to 
look upon the story as an allegory, which is now-a-days 
the case with a large portion (magna pars) of the 
learned of our church, will see reason for doing so, 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 133 

partly in the original source of the details, for these are 
taken from spurious and unauthentic writings ; partly in 
the discrepancies which enter into the different accounts ; 
partly from the silence of many writers, and especially 
of many of the popes, who do not generally omit what 
thus concerns the interests of the church. One thing 
certain is, that the c Liber Pontificalis ' shows that the 
thing was but very little and very vaguely talked of at 
Rome ; and even the words mentioning that it was ever 
talked of are only found in some of the copies of that 
document." 

Father Antony Austen Touttee, a Benedictine (a.d. 
1720), says in his Notes upon Cyril of Jerusalem: 
" What is here related of the downfal of the Samaritan at 
the prayers of the apostles, is not regarded by many oe 
our modern writers in the light of a fact ; as well be- 
cause Justin Martyr, Irengeus, Tertullian, and Eusebius, 
say nothing whatever about it, only spurious writings 
first vouching for its reality (propter primam historian 
fidem ex pseudepigraphis petitam) ; as on account of 
the great differences subsisting in the details of the 
different writers. For some say Paul's prayers, as well 
as Peter's, were employed on the occasion; others, 
Peter's alone; some, that prayer alone effected the 
downfal of the flying chariot ; others, that fasting was 
employed as well as prayer; some, that the Samaritan 
had only his legs broken by the fall ; others, that his 
whole body was dashed to pieces. All these discrepan- 
cies, however, would not prevent us from looking at the 
story as a fact, if it were confirmed as such by any satis- 
factory authorities, (si aliunde certis monumentis firma- 
retur.) But the reader will do well to see what Dr. 
Cotelier says about it." 

The learned Charles Weis, (a.d. 1809), a Roman- 
catholic contributor to the " Bibliotheque Universelle," 
a work sanctioned and largely contributed to by the 
Roman church, says, after giving the usual story : "It 
is, however, generally agreed upon, (mais on s'accorde 
generalement, ) now-a-days that this story is not to be 
looked upon as a fact." 



134 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

The Abbe* Pluquet, (a.d. 1780,) in bis Dictionary of 
the Heresies, dedicated to a Roman-catholic archbishop, 
a friend of his, makes the same remark : " Nevertheless 
that story, as a fact, is regarded as unauthentic. For, to 
say nothing of the difficulty of supposing it consistent 
with history, it is quite certain that the downfal of this 
fiery chariot, through Peter's prayers, would have been 
too important an event to have escaped the knowledge 
of the Christian world, and to have been left unrecorded 
by the earlier Fathers; yet neither St. Justin, nor St. 
Irenasus, nor Tertullian, say one word about this chariot, 
— they who told us so much about the statue." 

Thus, Father M c Corry and the Correspondent in the 
Times are bound to show upon what grounds they dis- 
sent from the majority of their own church respecting 
the allegorical character of this fiery chariot and of 
the various other little incidents connected with it by the 
writers of the 13th century — most of which are stated in 
the last section of this work ; and not only upon what 
grounds they dissent, but also upon what grounds they 
expect that the enlightened classes of Great Britain and 
Ireland will in the 19th century accept as authentic 
history, what the church at Rome, even in its darkest 
ages — 600 years ago — did not profess to regard in any 
other light than as a mere nursery tale, like St. George 
and the Dragon, and the other similar stories with which 
it was published. 

But the main point to be at present attended to is, 
what Arnobius himself thought upon the subject; and 
he, it has been shown, neither says that it was in Europe 
that the first Roman converts saw the fiery horses in 
the air above their heads, nor that the apostle was pre- 
sent when they saw them, — nor does he say that it was 
not an allegory, nor that he derived the story from any 
other writer. We have not, therefore, the shadow of a 
reason to infer from the three or four words quoted 
from this African writer, that St. Peter abandoned for a 
single hour the great Jewish appointment assigned to 
him by our Lord. 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 135 



XXVIII. 

Lactantius (about a.d. 330), another African, and said 
to have studied eloquence under Arnobius, but who 
enjoyed a much higher reputation as a writer than his 
master, is also supposed to have inferred from the 
Kripvy/uia Tlerpov, already so often alluded to, that St. Peter 
came into Europe ; because the following passage occurs 
in a chapter in which this writer is speaking of that 
written document, ascribed, as will be seen, by him and 
others to both Paul and Peter, and in which Lactantius 
says that the apostles repeated some of our Lord's pre- 
dictions respecting the events that occurred in the 
siege of Jerusalem. Lactantius thus expresses himself 
(iv. 21): 

" Our Lord also disclosed certain prophecies to his 
disciples which Peter and Paul published at Rome ; and 
that publication having taken place in a written form, 
so as not to be forgotten — (Ea Prsedicatio in me- 
moriam scripta) — was still to be met with after all 
these things had happened. In it, among many other 
remarkable predictions, the apostles mentioned (in qua 
dixerunt) that Providence would soon send a king to 
exterminate the Jews, &c, and so it was. After the 
apostles were dead, — after Nero had slain them, — Ves- 
pasian annihilated the name and nation of the Jews, and 
all those things happened which the apostles had fore- 
told." 

The commentators in communion with the church of 
Rome acknowledge, without any exception, that when 
Lactantius here speaks of Peter as promulgating Chris- 
tianity in the capital of the empire, he alludes to the 
Kripvy/Lia ILrpov — " Peter's Preaching," or u Proclama- 
tion," which, as Eusebius informs us, (ii. 14,) was sent 
to Rome by Peter for that purpose. Father Dufresnoy, 



136 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

in his edition of Lactantius, (Paris, 1748, iv. 21,) says 
of the document here mentioned : " This was the title of 
a work erroneously attributed to St. Peter, and now lost ; 
for the particulars respecting which the reader is referred 
to Fabricius, in his ' Codex Apocryphus' of the New 
Testament, (p. 800.) 

John Albert Fabricius, a distinguished scholar of the 
eighteenth century, says, in his Codex Apocryphus, " We 
may conclude from Clemens Alexandrinus, and from 
Lactantius, (iv. 21,) that 'Peter's Proclamation,' and 
4 Paul's Proclamation,' were one and the same document, 
which is sometimes quoted under the name of only one 
of them, and sometimes under the name of both. The 
reader is recommended to look at what has been col- 
lected on that subject by the illustrious Grabbe, in his 
c Spicilegium' (vol. i.)" 

John Ernest Grabius says, on this passage of Lac- 
tantius, in his " Spicilegium," (vol. i.) — " And Lactantius 
quotes these words from the written Proclamation of 
Peter and Paul, although I suspect, as I shall show pre- 
sently, that they Were taken from the Apocalypse of St. 
Peter." Where see much more on the same point. 

Father (Edward) Xavier (a.d. 1617) also says upon 
this passage, (same edition) : " A work which St. Jerome 
looks upon as apocryphal has appeared under this title 
of ' Peter's Preaching,' or ' Petri Prasdicatio,' which is no 
longer extant." 

Valesius, in allusion to the same work, says, (upon 
Eusebius iii. 3): "I wonder to find Eusebius sa}^ that 
the work which was called the Kripvyima Uzrpov was not 
quoted by any of the ancients." And again : " As to 
the work which was called the Ki^v-y/xa, or c Peter's Pro- 
clamation,' it is cited b}^ Clemens Alexandrinus, and also 
by Lactantius, who mentions this document in the 20th 
chapter of his 4th book." 

Thus the Roman church herself admits, that it was in 
and by this document that Peter published those predic- 
tions which Lactantius here says he published at Rome. 
This passage, therefore, affords no evidence whatever 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 137 

that Peter, at any period, forsook the lost sheep of the 
house of Israel to come into Europe, or that Lactantius 
inferred he did so, from the existence of this document. 
Cardinal Bellarmine, indeed, says that we have stronger 
evidence in the last clause of the foregoing passage, in 
which Lactantius says : " After Peter was dead, after 
Nero had slain him, Vespasian annihilated the nation of 
the Jews." But this requires no answer. I only draw 
attention to it to show the straits and contradictions to 
which the Roman clergy are reduced in their honest 
struggle to uphold the absurd pretensions and delusions 
in which they have been educated. Did the Roman em- 
perors put no one to death except at Rome? Father 
Palma, as may be seen in the section on Clemens Ro- 
manus, exposes the absurdity of such a notion; and 
Father Dufresnoy admits, in his own note upon these 
words of Lactantius, that it was not certain that Peter 
was put to death at Rome, and that an expression of this 
kind does not show where either Paul or Peter died. 
" All that we know for certain upon this point," says he, 
"is, that Paul was put to death at Rome." (Certum 
est Paulum Romse Martyrium passum esse.) 

The writer in the Times is singularly misinformed as 
to the testimony of Lactantius. He supposes this author 
to have thought that Peter had been in Europe, because 
there is a statement to that effect in a little tract of the 17th 
century, which was once, for a few years, attributed to 
Lactantius. But is not the writer in the Times aware, 
that nearly a century and a half ago this tract was dis- 
covered to be a forgery, and a very clumsy one, — so 
clumsily constructed, in short, for the part it had to 
play, that the Roman elergy endeavour now to make 
out that it could never have been even intended by the 
person who wrote it to have been passed off as having 
been written by Lactantius? Is he not aware that, as 
far back as a.d. 1710, Father Le Nourry, a Benedictine 
monk of great learning and celebrity, proved, in the 
clearest manner, that there was not the slightest reason 
for supposing it to be the production of Lactantius ? Is he 



138 THE ANTENICENE EECORDS. 

not aware, that in these days not one of the Roman clergy 
pretend to say it was ? and that it is now regarded by them 
as the work of some unknown writer, at some unknown 
period ? Father Palma of Rome, for instance, one of the 
most recent writers in communion with that church, and 
lately Professor of Ecclesiastical History at the College 
of the Propaganda, says, in his " Preelections," (part i. 
p. 38) : " The book on the Deaths of the Persecutors, 
which used to be attributed to Lactantius, was written 
by some person named Ca3cilius." But even Father 
M e Corry, by not citing it, shows that he was aware of 
its being spurious; or at least that he could find no 
modern writer authorizing him to put it forward as 
authentic. On a subject so universally acknowledged by 
all the Roman clergy, as well as by the College of the 
Propaganda at Rome, it might seem unnecessary to 
add any other testimony to that of Father Palma ; but 
lest what the writer in the Times has said should mislead 
any one as to the justice of the decision to which all the 
learned have come respecting this document, and as to 
the clearness of the grounds upon which they have re- 
jected it, I subjoin the following particulars : — 

The full name of Lactantius was, " Lucius Caecilius 
Firmianus Lactantius;" and though there are a few of 
his MSS. upon which the whole name is thus inscribed, 
there are also many upon which we only find " Firmianus 
Lactantius." His work, " De Persecutione," mentioned 
by St. Jerome as extant in his day, has never since been 
found. In a.d. 1678, a MS. was produced at Moissac, 
in France, in the department of the Tarn-et-Garonne, at 
a monastery there, with the following title : u The Book 
on the Deaths of the Persecutors/' addressed to the Con- 
fessor Donatus, and written by Lycius Cecilius. Now, 
one of the undisputed works of Lactantius, that " De 
Ira," is also addressed to Donatus the Confessor, and no 
one can dispute the plausibility that attaches in these 
cases to the want of uniformity in the author's name. It 
is a point that all forgers attend to, more or less, although 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 139 

in this case, as will be seen, the utter dissimilarity of 
name seems very much to overhit its own mark. Stephen 
Baluze, a zealous Koman Catholic, of immense learning 
and immense fame, who had for many years the manage- 
ment of Colbert's library, immediately published this 
MS. as the lost work of Lactantius, although there was 
nothing whatever connected with the MS. to lead one to 
suppose that it was not the production of one of the 
monks of Moissac, except some very awkward allusion to 
what might have been the state of a person's feelings and 
circumstances when writing in those times, which, in the 
eyes of many, will only make the forgery more apparent. 
However that may be, the work contained the most 
unobjectionable statement, as Baluze then said, that had 
yet been found about Peter's being in Europe, and it 
was triumphantly received by the Roman clergy. 

As there was but one MS., and this accessible to very 
few persons, every new edition was copied from its pre- 
decessor, so that the act of Stephen Baluze (in substi- 
tuting the name " Lucius Csecilius Firmianus Lactantius" 
for " Lycius Cecilius," and " De Persecutione" for " De 
Mortibus Persecutorum ") remained undetected about 
thirty years ; until at length Father Le Nourry, seeing 
many improbabilities in the body of the work, and sus- 
pecting something wrong, looked into the MS. He saw 
at once what the over-zealous Baluze had done, and, 
with an amount of indignant spirit unusual in such 
cases, had a correct copy immediately published, with a 
fac-simile (to be now seen at the British Museum) of the 
title and first page of the MS., whereby the extraordinary 
conduct of Stephen Baluze, the librarian of the great 
Colbert, and the accepted antiquarian of the Roman 
church, was most unequivocally and for ever exposed. 
Father Le Nourry, a Benedictine, fervently devoted to 
the prerogatives of the see of Rome, is one of those who 
have attempted to show what the probabilities were of 
Peter's having been in Europe ; but even he felt, that to 
defend his cause by such a stratagem as this, was to 



140 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

abandon it altogether. He therefore acknowledged that 
Lactantius affords no testimony npon this favourite 
theory of the Roman clergy. 

Father Le Nourry's account of the discovery of this 
MS. will not be uninteresting: — "This MS. struggled 
for its existence among the moths and worms of the 
libraries until the great John Baptist Colbert gave direc- 
tions to M. Foucault, then royal intendant of that part 
of France, which is now called the Tarn-et-Garonne, to 
search all the libraries of that district. In consequence 
of which, M. Foucault went in April, a.d. 1678, to 
Moissac, to an old Benedictine monastery that was there, 
called anciently the " Abbey of a Thousand Monks," but 
occupied in his days by what they call Secular Friars. 
After he had been hospitably received by these, they 
took him to a place, the atmosphere of which was most 
unfavourable to the preservation of MSS., (locum cuilibet 
coeli intemperiei aerisque inclementige expositum). He 
there found several masses of MSS., (plures acervos,) 
heaped together in a disgusting state, and with the 
parchment almost entirely destroyed. From these, how- 
ever, he at once picked up two hundred and fifty MSS., 
older, and in a better state of preservation, than the rest, 
(vetustiores et saniores,) and among these the one in 
question, taking the greatest care to keep it apart from 
all the rest. He then procured the permission of the 
abbe and friars to send all these MSS. to Colbert's 
library in Paris, where they have been ever since. The 
learned Baluze, who had had for several years the ma- 
nagement of Colbert's library, after having carefully 
looked through this one of the MSS., came to the con- 
clusion that Lactantius must have been the person meant 
as the author of it. Therefore he had it printed the fol- 
lowing year as the work of that writer." (Cecilius, 
by Le Nourry. Preface.) 

The following disclosure as to the importance of this 
document to the church of Pome, if it could have been 
shown not to be a forgery, is from the pen of the learned, 
upright, and zealous papist who was first deceived about 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 141 

it, and is entitled to the attention of every earnest and 
conscientious Roman Catholic. Baluze writes as follows : 
— " Although I consider that it is useless to deny, as 
some do, Peter's journey to the city of Rome, which is 
proved by the clearest evidence, I nevertheless see very 
great uncertainty about the time he went there; for 
there are several very great difficulties connected with 
the notion of his having gone there in the reign of Clau- 
dius (as Baronius supposes), inasmuch as it obliges us 
to suppose that he went there twice, and had two contests 
there with the Samaritan heretic, — once under Claudius, 
and again under Nero. How preposterous such a 
notion as this is, (Quae res quam absurda sit,) when no 
ancient writer states it, those well know who are ac- 
quainted with this subject. For as Cardinal Baronius 
himself justly observes, every one disregards as untrue 
what a later writer states, without the authority of some 
one preceding him. If, therefore, I may be permitted 
to dissent from that notion, I should be disposed to 
prefer the statement of Lactantius ( 4 On the JDeaths of 
the Persecutors,' chap, ii.) ; I mean, I should fully grant 
that the apostle proclaimed the Gospel at Rome in per- 
son ; not however in Claudius's, but in Nero's reign ; for 
this view of the matter, the only true one as I think, 
being thus once established upon the indisputable autho- 
rity of Lactantius, all controversy is immediately at an 
end, and that, too, without any disadvantage to the 
authority of the Pope ; for it is not length of time, but 
Peter's being there at all that is required for the supre- 
mac}^ of our church." (Baluz. in Lact.) 

Thus, over and above the proofs of spuriousness brought 
forward by Father Le Nourry and the various other Ro- 
man-catholic commentators, the four following suspicious 
circumstances have, we see, attended the discovery of the 
MS. in question. 1. The occasion upon which it made its 
appearance was one well known to afford great tempta- 
tion to the forgery of MSS. ; for Colbert, the celebrated 
minister of Louis XIV., had a little before commissioned 
his friends and agents, in the different provinces of 



142 THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 

France, to search out and send him all the ancient MSS. 
they could find. 2. All the MSS. that were lying in the 
same place in which this one was- — and we are told there 
were several heaps of them — were of a medieval or post- 
medieval date ; insomuch, that not one of them appears 
to have been old enough to have been thought worth 
publishing. 3. It contains a statement about Peter's 
being in Europe, which Baluze (into whose hands it 
came, as Colbert's librarian), acknowledged to have been 
very much wanted, in support of the Papal supremacy, 
as the evidence they previously employed upon that 
point was no longer credible or satisfactory. 4. Al- 
though the cellar or place in which it was found was so 
damp as to have almost quite destroyed all the other 
MSS. that were there, this one is in the most perfect 
condition possible, the few words in it that are illegible 
being rendered so by some substance of a sticky nature 
having touched it on that spot, as Le ISourry mentions 
in his notes. 

Accordingly, we find that from the very first there 
were doubts entertained as to the authenticity of this 
work. Bishop Pearson admitted, that although he 
thought it might be authentic, others might not be able 
to bring themselves to this conclusion, and Le Nourry, 
in his preface, says that various persons had already ex- 
pressed their misgivings on the subject before any proofs 
had been laid before them. Even Father Ceillier, one of 
Le Nourry's contemporaries, does not appear to have 
entered into the delusions of Baluze about the authen- 
ticity of this work, although the writer in the Times 
gives us to understand he did. On the contrary, Ceillier 
hesitates to pronounce an opinion, acknowledging that 
there are arguments in favour of Le Nourry's view, 
stating what they are, and recommending them to atten- 
tion. He writes thus : " M. Baluze was the first who 
published that document, and he did not scruple to 
attribute it to Lactantius. One of his reasons for be- 
lieving him the author of it was, because he supposed 
that the title, " On the Deaths of the Persecutors," given 



THE ANTENICENE RECORDS. 143 

to that work in the MS. he found, which is the only one 
we haye, was of the same import as the title " On 
Persecution," which is cited by St. Jerome, in his list 
of Lactantius's writings. He also went upon the cir- 
cumstance that the names Lucius Caecilius, which was 
inscribed (Lycius Cecilius) upon the MS. in question, 
are found prefixed to those of Firmianus Lactantius, 
in another MS. of other works, known as certainly the 
productions of Lactantius. Finally, he thought he could 
discern the style of Lactantius in this document .... 
Father Le Nourry, the Benedictine, is almost the only 
one who has yet written on the other side. His argu- 
ments have been combated by several of the learned ; 
but as there is some force in them, we have thought it 
might be of use to set them before our readers in an 
abridged form. He says then," &c. &c. (Ceillier in 
Lactant.) Accordingly, although Ceillier sometimes 
seems rather to incline to the opinion of Baluze, and not 
to consider this a production of the 17th century, he 
nowhere speaks of Lactantius as the author of it. He 
even adds: "We do not know who this Cecilius was; 
we only know that there was a whole family of distinc- 
tion at Rome that bore that name." (On ignore qui 
etait ce Cecilius. On sait seulement qu'il y avait une 
famille entiere tres illustre qui portait ce nom. Ceill. 
ibid.) Thus, not even the great effort made upon this 
occasion, by Baluze and Colbert, has rendered the name 
of Lactantius available to the Roman clergy in this con- 
troversy. This is fully admitted by Father Palma, of 
Rome. Upon what grounds then does the Correspondent 
in the Times profess to contradict Father Palma and all the 
rest of the modern clergy of the church of Rome? Is 
the Roman-catholic church of these islands more credu- 
lous or less instructed than that of Italy? This would 
be a severe and unwarranted conclusion respecting it. 



PART II. 

EUSEBIUS, 



Eusebius, archbishop of Csesarea, in Cappadocia, and 
one of the Greek Fathers (a.d. 340), wrote a history of 
the church, in which he tells us (iii. 31 ) that he gives all 
the facts that had come down to his times respecting the 
apostle Peter. In this history he is supposed to assert 
that St. Peter was in Europe, and that he was not put 
to death (as the Scriptures indicate) at Babylon. But 
it will be seen that he asserts neither of these alleged 
facts. Some of his translators, indeed, represent him as 
doing so; but every Greek scholar who is acquainted 
with the original, is aware that Eusebius has made no 
such assertions. 

It is, however, perhaps here of equal, if not greater 
importance, to observe that if Eusebius had asserted 
what is here alleged, this could not be regarded as even 
a slight indication of the supposed facts. Eusebius, it 
must not be forgotten, wrote nearly three centuries after 
the events in question could have occurred, and had as 
we have seen no intervening record of them to ad- 
vert to, although there were no less than one hundred 
and fifty ecclesiastical writers who preceded him, and 
some of them extremely voluminous. His sole authority, 
therefore, (for such it would have been,) could, under 
such circumstances, have had no weight whatever. No 



EUSEBIUS. 145 

historical event — no event even merely traditional has 
ever been accepted, or ever could be accepted, as au- 
thentic upon the sole testimony of a writer who lived 
so many generations after the supposed period. This 
is an important consideration with regard to Eusebius, 
too much overlooked by some writers" on this subject; 
but overlooked clearly from its having been hitherto 
erroneously supposed that writers long before the time 
of Eusebius had attested the event in question. 

It need scarcely be observed that if a historian of the 
present day states now for the first time some remark- 
able fact respecting Henry VIII., without having any 
authority to assign for his statement, his testimony 
would be refused. No one would think it unreasonable 
to disbelieve such a statement ; on the contrary, no one 
would think it at all reasonable to believe it. No one 
would be expected to take important steps in reference 
to it, — to establish institutions, to construct theories, 
confessedly of the gravest import, that were wholly 
founded upon such a statement. In one word, no one 
would or could believe it. I say, therefore, that even if 
Eusebius had made the statement imputed to him, it 
could have no weight as evidence with honest and earnest 
minds, inasmuch as it would have been the first state- 
ment of the event in any kind of writer for three cen- 
turies after it is supposed to have occurred. On this I 
presume that no one, Roman Catholic or Protestant, will 
entertain the least doubt. Eusebius, however, as I shall 
now show, does not make the statement imputed to 
him. 

Before I proceed to correct the misconceptions abroad 
respecting this writer, it is proper to remove at once two 
fresh errors set up (no doubt inadvertently) by the 
Correspondent in the Times. In the first place, it is 
quite a mistake to suppose that Eusebius mentions any- 
where " several important transactions of this apostle in 
that city.'' 1 The Correspondent is totally misinformed 
upon this point. Eusebius asserts no one thing, im- 
portant or unimportant, that Peter is even ever said to 
have done in person at Rome. Not one day is indicated 

L 



146 EUSEBIUS. 

that lie passed there; not one spot on which he trod 
there ; not one word stated that he uttered there ; not 
one person mentioned to whom he spoke there. To 
suppose that Eusebius mentions anything of this kind is 
mere delusion, of which any one can easily satisfy him- 
self, from the most careless English translation of the 
history. The utmost that we find upon this point in 
Eusebius is a mere conjecture, incidentally suggested by 
himself, that as Peter's relics had been found at Rome 
in the fourth century, when Constantine was there, the 
apostle might not, perhaps, have been put to death at 
Babylon ; for it is to be observed, that Peter's Second 
Epistle, in which the apostle indicates (i. 14) his mar- 
tyrdom as about to take place at Babylon, was not, in 
the days of Eusebius, universally acknowledged to be 
authentic by the churches. The conjecture of Eusebius, 
therefore, at that time, did not, as it now would, contradict 
the Bible. It did not take into account that Epistle. 
" What is called Peter's First Epistle," says Eusebius, 
(iii. 4,) "has been always acknowledged as authentic; 
and the earliest fathers have quoted it as indisputable 
authority. But that which is called his Second Epistle, 
is not considered by all of us to be authentic ; although, 
as being a useful exhortation, it is esteemed and read 
with the other Scriptures." And, beyond this very loose 
conjecture, Eusebius will be found to give no counte- 
nance whatever to the story about Peter's having been in 
Europe. " He suggests no other reason," says Cardinal 
Bellarmine, (De sum. Pont.,) "except these relics, for 
supposing Peter to have died in Italy." It is also a 
great mistake to say that it is u in several places" that 
Eusebius adverts even to this conjecture. In this respect, 
also, the Roman Catholic in the Times is utterly and 
strangely misinformed. He mentions it but once in the 
whole ten books of his history, distinctly representing it, 
on that occasion, as a mere loose conjecture of his own, 
not supporting it by any authority, and never again 
adverting to it. 

The passage in which he states it occurs in the first 
chapter of the third book. After having mentioned, 



EUSEBIUS. 147 

towards the end of book ii., that Peter had undergone 
his predicted crucifixion during Nero's persecution, when 
that emperor had conquered the masters of Babylon, 
(ttiv avaToXriv iravav viroTa^aq^ ii. 25,) and that his relics 
were supposed to have existed at Rome from Nero's 
time, the historian then says (iii. 1) : x — "It is not im- 
probable (koiKE. there is some reason to suspect) that 
during the time Peter was proclaiming the gospel to the 
Jews of the Dispersion, he may have resided in Pontus, 
and Galatia, and Bithynia, in Cappadocia and Asia ; and 
even that he may have been finally at Rome when he 
was crucified, with his head downwards, he having him- 
self also considered that it was in this posture he was 
to die." 

That Eusebius here neither makes, nor intends to 
make, a positive statement as to the point in question, 
is as evident as language can make it. It is true that he 
adverts at the same time to two facts, of which there 
never was a question ; but that circumstance, the atten- 
tive reader will see, makes no difference as to the purely 
conjectural character of the passage, and of the two other 
allusions in it. There never was a doubt, in the early 
church, as to the fulfilment of our Lord's prediction re- 
specting Peter's crucifixion with his head downwards, 
nor ever a doubt as to Peter's fulfilment of our Lord's 
commands, in devoting himself to the cities of the Dis- 
persion, in which the Jews were in the greatest numbers. 
It is not to be supposed that these are the points to 
which Eusebius here alludes, as " seeming likely," and 
as "not impossible." These facts it would have been 
unscriptural to question. The historian, being one 
of the bishops of Cappadocia, naturally enough volun- 
teers a conjecture that, as the apostle mentions Cappa- 
docia in his First Epistle, (i. 1,) it was not at all unlikely 
or improbable that, on some occasion, he may have lived 
in that and the surrounding districts of the Greek church 
mentioned in the same Epistle. Also, as certain relics, 
supposed to be those of the apostle Peter, were discovered 
in the catacombs at Rome in the days of this archbishop 
and his patron, Constantine the Great, and were as such 

l2 



148 EUSEBIUS. 

deposited by tHe Emperor and the Roman bishop of that 
day in three of the new churches that the Emperor then 
built in that city, the historian, purely on account of 
that circumstance, (as is admitted by Bellarmine,) 
suggests, also as a conjecture of his own, although he 
had never been at Rome, and apparently as a mere 
equivalent and counterpoise between the Greek and the 
Latin churches, that there was no reason for not think- 
ing that the apostle may even have suffered his martyr- 
dom in Europe. For, as has been already observed, the 
authenticity of Peter's Second Epistle, in which this 
martyrdom is indicated as about to occur at Babylon, 
was not yet then universally admitted. 

I wish, on two points in connexion with this passage, 
(on account of the importance attached to it,) to add 
illustration. First, I wish to show that Eusebius himself 
did not consider that it was known, even by tradition, 
that it was at Rome that Peter was put to death. Secondly, 
I wish to show, that even the Roman clergy themselves, 
up to a very late period, did not consider that anything 
more was known upon this point, (except as A conjec- 
ture, ) than what is mentioned in St. John's Gospel and 
in St. Peter's two Epistles. 

1. On the first of these points we derive the clearest 
possible indication of the historian's meaning from 
the context of the very passage we are considering; 
for in this chapter he first tells us that there existed 
a tradition in his day as to the places in which St. 
Thomas, St. Andrew, and St. John lived and died, 
using, to denote that idea, the ordinary Greek word for 
tradition, {irapa^oaiq). He then abandons that term 
to speak of Peter, and introduces what he says of him 
with the usual Greek expression for denoting a conjec- 
ture, (^ot/ce,), saying, that in addition to what the Scrip- 
tures inform us, he saw reason for thinking that Peter 
may have lived in his own diocese of Cappadocia on some 
occasion, and have died in Europe; adding, that as to 
Paul, it was historically recorded by Origen, both that 
he had travelled in Illyria, and that he had died at Rome. 
The conclusiveness of this illustration induces me to 



EUSEBIUS. 149 

transcribe here the whole passage from the original, a 
translation of which has been already given for the 
English reader in the section upon Origen. 

To/V Ss UpOJV TQU %WTnp0S V)[AUV X7TOO~TO\0tJV T£ XXI [JUzQYITOtJV E^' 

a,7ra,(rav xxTotairxpEvrcov rr t v oix.ovfj.evw Qcofxjcs fxsv, us ri TrxpxSocris 
Trspisy^si, tojv TIocpQtxv Eikw%Ev 9 AvSpsxg $s rnv x %xvQlocv, Iuxwyi; vm 
Aoixv, it pot ovs xxi "Sixtqi-^xs ev E^sfoj teXevtu. YIetqos £e ev Uovrco 
xoci Txkxri^ xxi BiQuvix, KxTrirxSoxiot ts xoci Acna XExnpw/jivxi rois ev 
<$ixo~7ropx loul$ociois eoixev' os xxi etti teXei ev 'Vco/xri ysvo[MEvos avsaxoKoTTiaQn 
xxrx xstfixXrit; ovtcos xvto; x^icoaocs tcocQeiv. Ti <$si irtpi YlxvXov Xsysiv, 
ccno 'IsgovoxXniA {Asxpi rov lXXupixov TtEiiXnpooxoTOS to EUxyysXtov tou 

X.pi(TTOV, XXI VQ-TSpOV EV TY) 'Vcc^y ETTI NspCVVOS [A£[AX%TU pYjXOTOS ', TxVTX 

QgiysvEi xxroc Xe%iv ev rpirco rofxco rcov sis rwv ysvEOiv s^Yiynrixcov oxtycos 

Etp'fiTXl. 

We have a further illustration of this point in book ii. 
c. 25, where Eusebius endeavours to fix the period at 
which the two leading apostles died, in order to com- 
mence his history of the churches from that date. The 
title of the chapter is, " On that Persecution of the 
Christian World in Nero's reign, during which Paul and 
Peter were honoured for their piety with martyrs' monu- 
ments at Rome," (icaO' bv e-rri 'PwjUrjc IlaiiXoc Kai Iltrpoc rote 
V7T£p evG&eiag (xaprvpioig KaTBKOGjuriOricFav*) And in it 

Eusebius mentioning an on-dit of his day to the effect 
that Peter's martyrdom, as well as Paul's, took place in 
Nero's reign, and during this Emperor's persecution of 
the Christians in the East, expressly avoids saying that 
Peter's martyrdom was supposed to have taken place in 
Europe, although he says that it was there that Paul's 
was supposed to have taken place. After describing 
Nero's ferocity of disposition and conquest of the Baby- 
lonian provinces, he writes thus : " And therefore Paul 
is said to have been beheaded even in the very city of 
Rome itself, (e7t' aimjc 'Pw^c,) and Peter to have been 
crucified likewise in the time of Nero." (TV avaro\r]v 

iraaav V7rora^ag, &C. . . . Tavrrf yovv ovrog Xzopayjog ev roig 
fiaXiara Trpwrog avaicripvydug ettl rag Kara rwv AttogtoXcov 
EirypOr) G(f*ayag. TlavXog S17 ovv £7r' avrrjg 'Pwjurje rrjv KE(j)a\r]v 
airorfxr]dr]vai^ Kai Tlerpog wGavrwg avaGKoXoiriGOr^vai kclt avrov 

iGTopovrai.) Where the collocation of the words alto- 
gether precludes the supposition that Eusebius here 



150 EUSEBIUS. 

meant to say that Peter was crucified where Paul was 
beheaded, — a suppression on the part of this exact writer 
which is the more remarkable as it occurs in the very 
clause in which, if there were even the alleged tradition 
or rumour on the subject, he would most naturally 
have made the statement of the one apostle as well as 
of the other. And that Peter was not put to death at 
some unknown period, but under the same Emperor as 
Paul, is, he adds, rendered probable by the association 
of their names in the most ancient sepulchral records at 
the Seat of government, (which would not, he supposes, 
have been likely to have occurred, if the time of Peter's 
death had been unknown there,) as well as by the distinct 
statement of Dionysius Corinthus, to the effect that they 
died " about the same time." In another passage, also, 
(iii.31,)in which Eusebius professes to recapitulate all the 
information which he was able to communicate in the 
chapter ii. 25, respecting Peter's martyrdom, he does not 
pretend to say that he told the place in which it occurred, 
or that there was any tradition about its being in Europe. 
His words there are, — " The time and manner of the 
death of Paul and Peter, and even the place where their 
relics were deposited after death, I have already shown." 
Some have been led to overlook the structure of the 
passage in ii. 25, from a mistaken impression that the 
Greek word u /^ a p™/ oto, ^" in the title, denoted a martj^r's 
death, as the Latin word "martyrium" often does; but 
this Greek word never has that signification, either 
in Eusebius or in any other ancient writer. It some- 
times signifies a martyr's attestation, — the testimony 
afforded by a martyr, whether that be attended with his 
death or not ; but ordinarily it signifies the monument 
or trophy placed over any little stone, bit of chain, or 
other relic that had ever been connected with the mart}/r 
and his sufferings. These monuments at Pome were at 
first erected under ground in the catacombs, between the 
Ostian and Appian roads, and subsequently above 
ground on the hill Bactisanus, now called the Vatican. 
On this use of the term in Eusebius, the Roman-catholic 
commentator, Valesius, says : " Maprvpiov is properly 



EUSEBIUS. 151 

the name applied to the place in which a martyr's relics 
are deposited," (proprie dicitur locus in quo, &c.) Ac- 
cordingly we find that Eusebius, as has been seen in his 
account of the apostolic martyrium at Constantinople, 
uses the term in this, its ordinary sense, as constantly as 
any other writer; and in his u Panegyric upon Constan- 
tine," ch. ix., he calls our Saviour's monument by the 
two names here applied to Peter's, a " martyrium" and 
a " trophy." Suicer in his Lexicon says : " Maprvpiov 
means a temple, or any little oratory erected to the 
honour and memory of a martyr," (Templum sive sacel- 
lum in Martyris alicujus honorem et memoriam pedifi- 
catum) and cites from Can. ix., Concil. Laodiceni. 
" To visit the cemeteries, or what were called Marty ria" 

yeig Ta Koifxr)Tr]pia rj tig ra Xe-yo/it^a /mapTvpia cnrievai). 

Henry Stephens, in his Thesaurus, says of this 
word : "It signifies testimony — sometimes even the 
witness himself — also the place in which a martyr's 
relics are kept." Scaliger, in Chronicon Eusebii, says : 
" It properly means the altar which is placed over the 
relics of a martyr." — (Martyrium proprie est altare im- 
positum Martyris cineribus.) Arndius, in his " Lexicon 
of Ecclesiastical Antiquities," says : " ra Maprvpia is the 
name applied to the places and monuments sacred to 
the martyrs" (loca et monumenta sacra martyribus.) 
Father Janning says in Acta Sanctorum (vol. vi. Jun. 
p. 111.) "In various places there were churches (and are 
still) which kept the bodies or other relics of their saints 
deposited in crypts beneath the ground, with an altar 
erected over them. These repositories (conditoria) were 
called martyrium by the Greeks, and confessio by the 
Latins, even in the most ancient times, and were, in 
most cases, situated underneath the principal altar of 
the church." Baronius, on the Eoman martyrology, 
says : " The place in which a martyr is buried, is called 
a martyrium ;" and, again : u What we call confessio 
in Imtin, is what is called martyrium in Greek." He 
also remarks upon this very chapter: " Precisely the 
same monuments which we call confessiones in Latin^ 
are called trophies by Caius in Eusebius ii. 25." The 



152 EUSEBIUS. 

Roman- catholic annotator, in Caillau's edition of the 
Fathers, published in Paris (a.d. 1836) says in Chrys- 
ostom, vol. ii. : " Marty rium means a church conse- 
crated in the name of a martyr, or in which the bones 
of a martyr are deposited. The word is frequently to be 
met with in the ecclesiastical writers" (vox frequens 
apud scriptores ecclesiasticos.) For Peter's martyrium 
in the catacombs, and the aperture at the top of it, the 
reader is referred to Father Aringhi, in his Roma Sub- 
terranea B. iii. ch. 3., &c. Thus there is nothing in the 
title of the chapter ii. 25 to justify the supposition that 
anything in that chapter alludes to the conjecture in iii.l. 
2. On the second point to be illustrated it is enough to 
quote the memorable words of Cardinal Baronius, as 
there is no one perhaps who has laboured with more 
zeal, or with more success, than he has, to throw an air 
of plausibility around this isolated and original conjec- 
ture of Eusebius, or who better knew the utter insuffi- 
ciency of the authorities by which it is supposed to be 
supported. " As to the history of the apostles," says 
Baronius (a.d. 44, paragraph 42), " after they once sepa- 
rated, we aee utterly in the dark (res perobscura est). 
For as (with the exception of our canonical scriptures) the 
actions and the writings that pass under the names of the 
apostles, are known to be mere fictions ; and as nothing 
whatever that has been related about the apostles by 
real and trustworthy writers, is now to be found in its 
original and uncorrupted form, we are compelled to 
despair of being ever able to know eor certain anything 
that really and truly took place in the lives of these holy 
men." — (Quod vero pertinet ad res ab ipsis apostolis 
gestas postquam ab invicem semel separati sunt, res qui- 
dem aaque perobscura est. Cum enim apostolorum nomine 
tarn facta quam scripta reperiantur esse supposititia, nee, 
si quid de illis a veris sincerisque scriptoribus narratum 
sit, integrum et incorruptum omnino reman serit, in despe- 
rationem plane quandam animum dejiciunt posse urfcjuam 
assequi quod verum certumque subsistat. ) This very 
just and remarkable admission of Baronius neither 
.Bellarmine nor any other Roman- catholic writer of the 



EUSEBIUS. 153 

least note, has ever pretended to contradict, although 
most of them have joined with Baronius in endeavour- 
ing to substantiate the conjecture of Eusebius. 

That the conjecture, therefore, then and thus first 
hazarded was purely a conjecture, and neither a tradi- 
tion nor even an on-dit, much less a historical fact, is 
evident both from the terms in which the archbishop 
of Cappadocia expresses it, from his silence respecting 
it on all other occasions, and from the admissions of 
those who have most narrowly and indulgently examined 
the grounds of it. It was, moreover, a conjecture for 
which there was in his day some excuse, as the epistle 
in which Peter says he was about to die at Babylon, 
was not then known to be Peter's. And that Eusebius 
did not pretend to allege any other grounds for his con- 
jecture except the supposed relics, is abundantly proved 
by the confession of Cardinal Bellarmine, that cannot be 
too often repeated: " Eusebius suggests," says he, " no 
other reason but the relics for supposing Peter to have 
died in Europe." 

As to whether the relics at Kome which gave rise to 
the conjecture, were really those of the apostle or not, 
does not require to be here examined, for we have 
already seen in the section upon Caius, that the pre- 
sence of a martyr's relics in a city was but a very slight 
reason indeed for suspecting that the martyr had been 
put to death there, and such as cannot be allowed for a 
moment to stand against the plain indication of the 
Scriptures. But that the general reader may not be 
uninformed as to the localities in which the Roman 
clergy state these relics to be now, and to have been 
anciently deposited, I give the following from Butler's 
Lives of the Saints (June 29), "St. Gregory (a.d. 604) 
writes, that the bodies of the two apostles were buried 
in the Catacombs two miles out of Rome (near the 
Ostian Road). The most ancient Roman Calendar pub- 
lished" by Bucherius, marks their festival at the Cata- 
combs on the 29th of June. ... At present, the 
heads of the two apostles are kept in silver bustoes in 
the church of St. John Lateran (near the beginning of 



154 EUSEBIUS. 

the Ostian Road). But one-half of the body of each 
apostle is deposited together in a rich vault in the great 
church of St. Paul, on the Ostian Road, and the other 
half of both bodies in a more stately vault in the 
Vatican church." And again (18 Nov., in a note): 
" St. Paul's Church stands on the Ostian Road. In a sub- 
terraneous vault under the patriarchal altar, lie half the 
relics of St. Peter and St. Paul." The following account 
of this division of the relics is from the Acta Petri, by 
Paulus iEmilius Sanctorius, Archbishop of Urbino (in 
Italy), which work was published at Rome a.d. 1597, 
and may be seen in the Acta Sanctorum (vol. 6, for 
June) : " Peter's bones," says Sanctorius, " were mixed 
with Paul's in the Catacombs, either because it was 
the will of heaven that they who had lived in affection 
and brotherhood should be enclosed in the same busto, 
or because the Asiatics did it out of malignity. For 
certain people from the east came over, out of affection 
for the apostles, who had lived so much among them, 
and because they envied the Italians the good fortune 
that resulted from the possession of their relics, and 
made an attempt to carry off the bodies; but being 
discovered and frightened by the Roman Christians 
who had arms in their hands, they threw the bodies 
into a well there (in puteum quendam ad Catacumbas). 
This was about two, or rather less than two, miles out- 
side the Capine Gate (between the Appian and the 
Ostian Road). At a subsequent period, there was a 
voice from heaven declaring that the larger bones were 
the preacher's, the smaller bones the fisherman's; and 
immediately St. Sylvester, the high priest of Rome, 
when Constantine was leaving Rome to live at Byzan- 
tium, weighed out these relics in equal quantities 
(a.d. 319), after having first separated them upon a 
slab of porphyry ; and one half of each body was placed 
in the church now called the Vatican, the other half of 
each body in St. Paul's, and the two heads in the 
church of St. John Lateran." Father Aringhi gives a 
similar account of this transaction in his Roma Subter- 
ranea, book iii. chap. iii. Father Janning ( Acta Sane* 



EUSEBIUS. 155 

torum, vol. vl., for June, p. 123), to whom tlie reader 
is referred for many interesting particulars upon this 
subject, makes a very just distinction when he says that 
the weighing was only necessary to divide Peter's relics 
into two equal parts, as the voice had already enabled 
Sylvester to distinguish Peter's relics from those of the 
other apostle. This writer mentions that at St. Paul's 
Basilica on the Ostian Road, there is the following 
inscription over the principal altar : — " Sub hoc altari 
requiescunt gloriosa corpora Apostolorum Petri et 
Pauli pro medietate; reliqua autem medietas reposita 
est in S. Petro; capita vero in S. Joanne Laterano." 
(Under this altar lie halves of the bodies of the 
Apostles Peter and Paul; the other halves of them are 
deposited at St. Peter's, and the two heads are in the 
Church of St. John Lateran.) He also mentions that 
the slab of porphyry upon which the division was 
effected by the Bishop Sylvester, is to be still seen in 
the Vatican, with the following inscription : — " Super 
isto lapide porfiretico fuerunt divisa ossa Sanctorum 
Apostolorum Petri et Pauli et ponderata per beatum 
Silvestrum Papam sub Anno Domini 319, quando facta 
fait ista Ecclesia." (Upon this stone of porphyry, the 
bones of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul were divided 
and weighed by St. Sylvester, the Pope, a.d. 319, when 
this church was built. ) The Lateran Church, of which 
many readers may not have often heard, is regarded 
by the Eoman clergy as the most important church at 
Rome. It contains a martyrium of John the Baptist, 
and another of St. John the Evangelist, built, as well 
as the whole church, by Constantine. Butler, in his 
Lives of the Saints, says, " The popes usually resided at 
this church, till Gregory IX. returning from Avignon, 
began to reside at St. Peter's, or the Vatican. This 
church, nevertheless, retains the pre-eminence above all 
other churches in Rome. . . . The Lateran Church is 
styled the head, the mother, and the mistress of all 
churches, as an inscription on its walls imports." 

St. Gregory the Great (a.d. 604) thus alludes to the 
foregoing history of St. Peter's relics in a letter to the 



156 EUSEBIUS. 

Empress Constantina, in which he refused to send her 
St. Paul's head, which she wrote from Constantinople 
to ask him for : — " In the earliest days of our church, 
people came from the east to take back the relics of the 
apostles, upon the ground that both the apostles belonged 
to them, which relics had been taken as far as the 
second milestone from the gate, and were deposited 
there, in a place called the Catacombs. When, how- 
ever, these people, although there was a great number 
of them, attempted to carry them off, a storm of 
thunder and lightning so completely terrified and dis- 
persed them, that they never again presumed to attempt 
anything of the kind. At a subsequent period, how- 
ever, the Christians of Rome went out and removed 
those relics, and placed them where they are now." — 
30 Epist. book iii. This original interment of Peter's 
relics in the Catacombs is thus adverted to by the 
Dominican Fathers in the Bibliotheque Sacree : " The 
body of St. Peter was, we are told {on dit) first 
interred in the Catacombs two miles from Rome." 
And Father Calmet writes to the same effect : " On dit 
que le corps de St. Pierre fut d' abord enterre aux 
Catacombes a deux milles de Rome." — {Diet.) 

The only earlier authority to which the Roman clergy 
refer us on this point is Eusebius, the historian of Cap- 
padocia, who alludes (ii. 25) to the relics found in his 
day, and to the foregoing distribution of them between 
the two Christian cemeteries of Rome — " This story (viz., 
Peter's being put to death as well as Paul in Nero's 
reign) is corroborated by the junction of their names in 
the appellation still given to the earliest Christian ceme- 
teries in that city, which are called the cemeteries of Peter 
and Paul. Caius, also, speaks thus of those parts of Rome, 
where the sacred relics of these two apostles have been 

just deposited" (aura Sri ravra irepi riov tottojv ev6a twv 
tiprijULEVUV cnroGToXcov ra Itpa GKriviDjiiaTa KararedeiTai.) Here 

follow the words of Caius, who, as has been already seen, 
mentions the Ostian road, and the Vatican hill, as the 
sites of the earliest Christian cemeteries. 

Of the foregoing points, then, respecting these relics, 



EUSEBIUS. 157 

the main outline to be remembered is this : That in the 
time of Caius (a.d. 250) the remains of the two apostles 
are supposed to have been lying together in the cata- 
combs, near the Ostian road, and no portion of them 
whatever on the Vatican hill, although there was even 
then a trophy there of both apostles — that no writer 
earlier than the historian of Cappadocia, ever mentions 
these relics — that more than a small portion of Peter's 
body is not supposed, even by the Roman clergy, to be 
now at the Vatican — that they suppose one half of it to 
be at St. Paul's on the Ostian road — that they suppose 
his head to be at the Lateran Church — that St. Gregory 
the Great said, that no more than half of Peter had ever 
been placed upon the Vatican hill, and that there was an 
interval of, at least, two centuries and a half, during 
which Peter's relics are supposed to have been in the 
catacombs, although not known to be there, nor men- 
tioned by any writer of that period, viz., from his 
martyrdom at Babylon (about a.d. 67) to the eccle- 
siastical miracle of the voice in the air, that was heard 
by St. Sylvester (a.d 319.) On some of the foregoing 
points, however, it ought to be stated, that there is 
rather a controversy among the Roman clergy, a few of 
whom contradict St. Gregory the Great, and say that 
he knew nothing at all about it, and that Peter's 
relics were removed several times from the catacombs 
to the Vatican, and from the Vatican to the cata- 
combs. Some also acknowledge that they cannot be 
very certain that any part of the apostle, but his head, 
had ever at any time been sent to Rome from the East. 
" We undoubtedly consider," says Father Hardouin on 
this point, " that Peter's head, at all events, was con- 
veyed by the Christians from Jerusalem to Rome after 
the siege, and that it ought to be held there in great 
veneration. But there is no necessity for supposing that 
Peter himself ever came to Rome." (Petri saltern caput 
Romam postea fuisse delatum a Christianis ex Hieroso- 
lymis omnino credimus, ibique religiose illud coli opor- 
tere. At Romam venisse Petrum necesse non est. ) 
Thus much for the information of the general reader. 



158 EUSEBIUS. 

It will be seen, however, that these controverted parti- 
culars about the relics, are all unimportant in the present 
question. 

II. 

All the other passages in Eusebius (except the fore- 
going conjecture) that are supposed to bear upon the 
point now in question, have been so notoriously mis- 
translated, or have been made the grounds for conclu- 
sions which they so notoriously do not warrant, that 
they have no weight now a days, except with such per- 
sons as have not access to the original. I shall, never- 
theless, lay a thorough analysis of each before the reader, 
as these passages (such as they are) constitute all, or 
almost all, that remains in the Fathers to be examined 
upon the subject. There are five of them. In one 
passage Eusebius is supposed to say that Peter came 
into Europe in person, against the impostor of Samaria, 
in the reign of Claudius ; in another, that Peter wrote 
his first epistle at Rome ; in a third, that he was there 
with Mark, when Mark wrote his gospel; in a fourth, 
that he was bishop there ; and, in a fifth, that Philo, the 
Jewish writer of Alexandria, saw him there. It will be 
found that the historian says none of these things. 

The first of these five passages occurs in the 14th 
chapter of the second book. It is brought forward by 
Father M c Corry, and the Correspondent in the" Times, as 
affording the most satisfactory evidence to every serious 
and enlightened mind, of the apostle's having come into 
Europe five and twenty years, or thereabouts, before he 
was put to death at Babylon. It will be seen, however, 
that the Greek text does not bear the interpretation 
these parties seek to give it, and that even if it had done 
so, even if it had borne them out in their views, it is ad- 
mitted by Baluze, Ceillier, and the Roman clergy in 
general, that such an interpretation of the passage would 
have clashed with all history, sacred and profane. Be- 
sides, everybody acknowledges that a statement made, for 
the first time, three hundred years after the event stated, 



EUSEBIUS. 159 

would be inadmissible as evidence of it. But, as I have 
said, Eusebius does not make it. After adverting to the 
existence of a Christian Church at Rome, in the reigns 
of Tiberius, Caligula, and Claudius, (in the preceding 
chapters ii. iii. and xiii.) the Archbishop of Cappadocia 
writes as follows: " The sorcerer of Samaria being 
struck with the lightning of the mind, when formerly, in 
Judsea, he was detected in his wickedness by the Apostle 
Peter, (Acts viii.) escaped immediately a great way 
westward across the seas, thinking that thus alone he 
could have any hope of getting on in his bad career. 
Beginning at Rome, he was greatly assisted by the 
spirit of evil that brooded above that city ; and had, in 
a short space of time, so far succeeded in his projects 
that after his death the inhabitants set up his image, 
and worshipped it. His triumph, however, did not long 
continue. Immediately afterwards, in the self-same 
reign of Claudius, the benign and all-gracious Pro- 
vidence of Heaven directs against Rome (ewi rriv 'Pw/iiji/) 
as against this pest of man, that great and active apostle, 
who, on account of his ability, was the leader of the 
rest; and he, as some gallant captain in the service of 
his Maker — yes, as one equipped in celestial panoply, 
succeeded in transporting to the inhabitants of the west 
the precious freight of spiritual light out of the east, light 
at once and a soul saving word by promulgating among 
them his j oy ful Proclamation ( to Kripvy/Jia ) of the heavenly 
kingdom ; and the divine word having, in this form, so- 
journed among the Romans, the influence of the sorcerer 
was foiled — aye, perished almost as rapidly as the man." 
The only modern Roman Catholics who interpret 
these words of Peter's having left the east, are Father 
M c Corry, and the writer in the Times. As these, how- 
ever, have published their mistaken interpretation of 
them, the reader is reminded that the Greek preposition 
£7ri with the name of a city in the accusative, as in this 
place, does not denote " going to the city," as these writers 
here translate, but " acting with reference to it" whether 
that be for or against ; and that this Greek preposition, in 
order to denote " going to a city," has always a genitive, as 



160 EUSEBIUS. 

every Greek scholar knows, and as Eusebius himself ex- 
presses this idea in the neighbouring chapters, when he 
says that Philo was " sent to Rome" (crraAa/^oc em ttiq 
'Pw^aiwy ttoXuoq, ii. 5), and that Philo "came to Rome" 
(eiri rrjg 'Fwjurjg atyucojxzvoQ, ii. 18), and that Paul was led 
in bonds to Rome (Seoyiioc £7ri 'Pw/urjg aysrai, ii. 22), as 
well as elsewhere throughout all his writings. The 
reader is also reminded, that this chapter does not profess 
to treat of St. Peter's arrival at Rome, but of the success 
of the Kripvy/Lia UsTpov in that city, when it was sent there 
against the heresy of the Gnostics; the title of the 
chapter being "On the Kripvy/naYIzTpov (the Apostle Peter's 
■ Message' or 'Proclamation') at Rome." Of this docu- 
ment Eusebius elsewhere (iii. 3) says : " As to that work, 
however, which is ascribed to Peter, called his ' preaching' 
or 'proclamation' (to |3i€Aio*' to Xsyojusvov avTov K-npvy/ua), 
we do not by any means know of its having been univer- 
sally received in all the churches." Valesius, the Ro- 
man-catholic commentator, says upon these words: 
" This book, which was called the Kripvypa or Prcedicatio 
Petri, is cited by Clemens Alexandrinus, &c, and, 
finally, by Lactantius, who mentions this document in 
the 20th chapter of his fourth book." Yalesius, also, 
says on Eusebius vi. 14 : " In the extracts from 
Theodotus, Peter's Apocalypse, is cited, and also his 
Kripvyima or Prcedicatio." Lactantius expressly informs 
us that this " preaching" or " message," called the 
Knpvyixa, was published at Rome, before the destruction 
of Jerusalem (a.d. 70) and that in it the Apostles pro- 
claimed and predicted many things to the Gentiles there. 
(See the section of the present work on the K^pvyjAa 
TlsTpov, also the section on Lactantius.) Clemens, the arch- 
bishop of Alexandria, in his treatise against the Gnos- 
tics (Stromat. lib. vi. c. 5., &c.) long before the time of 
Eusebius, often quotes the Kvpvyjua YleTpov as a work of 
the highest authority, and, as Le Clerc justly remarks, 
evidently looked upon it as having the sanction of the 
apostles. This archbishop's manner of quoting the docu- 
ment is as follows : " In the l^pvyjxa UtTpov you will 
find," &c. — " Peter says in the Kripvy/uLa that," &c. 



EUSEBIUS. 161 

— a Paul shows this in the Kripvy/ua Ylerpov, when he 
says/' &c. (or, perhaps, more properly translated, " in 
addition to it") — " In the early part of the Kr/puy/xa 
Ilerpov, our Lord says to his disciples," &c. &c. Origen, 
who also preceded Eusebius, informs us that Heracleon, 
one of the Samaritan's immediate successors in the 
Gnostic school, quoted from it as authentic. " It would 
be tedious," says Origen in his Commentary on St. John, 
" to produce here what Heracleon has quoted from what 
is called the Kepvypa Uerpov, or to stay to inquire re- 
specting that book whether it is to be regarded as 
genuine, or spurious, or interpolated." The reality of the 
work is thus clearly proved, although the work itself is 
now lost. No evidence, then, could be more complete 
of Eusebius's meaning, if the text were not clear enough, - 
than the title of this chapter ; for the titles of the chap- 
ters are proved to have been written by Eusebius him- 
self, and are admitted on all hands to have been so. It 
has been shown, however, that the text is abundantly 
explicit. 

But even if this chapter had been about Peter's having 
left the east in the reign of Claudius, the Roman clergy 
have long since acknowledged that no testimony to that 
effect could have been accepted, as such a statement 
would have contradicted both the Scriptures and the 
Fathers, and was in itself altogether improbable. Even 
Bishop Pearson and Mr. Baratier, Father Ceillier, and 
Baluze, the very authorities to whom the Correspondent 
in the Times refers us, acknowledge this. It is there- 
fore truly remarkable that Father M c Corry and this 
correspondent should have thus not only asserted an 
inaccurate interpretation of Eusebius, but also reas- 
serted the long since exploded hypothesis of the learned 
Cardinal Baronius, that Peter might have come into 
Europe in the reign of Claudius, twenty -five years before 
he was supposed to have been put to death. As, how- 
ever, these writers consider the hypothesis such conclu- 
sive evidence of Peter's having left the East, and as 
the errors into which they have fallen on this point 
might mislead others if allowed to remain uncontradicted, 

M 



162 EUSEBIUS. 

I must trespass upon the patience of the reader with a 
few quotations, to show that these writers are alone in 
their strange views, and that the Koman clergy have 
long since seen the necessity of abandoning this most 
extravagant hypothesis about the reign of Claudius and 
the Five-and- Twenty years. 

This theory was first promulgated by Baronius 
(a.d. 1607) some ten or twenty years before his death. 
He began by making the statement already quoted: 
" As to the history of the apostles, after they once 
separated from each other, the whole matter is overhung 
with extreme obscurity. . . . We cannot now hope to be 
ever able to know with anything like historical certainty 
what really took place in the subsequent lives of the 
--apostles." — ( Annal. a.d. 44, paragraph 42.) The annalist 
then puts it forward, as a not improbable supposition, 
that Peter may have passed from the East to Europe in 
the reign of Claudius, twenty -five years before he was 
put to death, deriving the suggestion, as he himself 
acknowledges, not from anything in the " Ecclesiastical 
History" by Eusebius, nor from anything in any writer 
previous to Eusebius, but from what all now admit to 
be a most inaccurate translation by Jerome, nearly a 
century afterwards, of another Greek work by Eusebius, 
the original of which is now lost. As, however, we learn 
from the Acts of the Apostles that Peter was subse- 
quently at Jerusalem, the Cardinal seeks to make his 
first hypothesis harmonize with this fact and with other 
passages of history, by a further hypothesis, to the effect 
that Peter might have gone back again from Europe to 
Jerusalem, though no ancient writer ever said he did, and 
that he might have come a second time from the East 
into Europe, in the reign of Nero. These two suppo- 
sitions once made, Baronius in his Annals, and naturally 
enough, deals with them (as Father Parsons did with 
Peter's residence in England) as facts that are no longer 
to be discussed or disputed; a circumstance which has 
misled many, for it was thence imagined that he must 
have had evidence for them in authentic records, and 
that he did not regard them as suppositions. 



EUSEBIUS. 163 

Fleury, Bossuet, Petau, Calmet, Bellarmine, Yalesius, 
Ceillier, and all the Roman- catholic writers, without 
exception, acknowledge that if the first supposition is 
allowed to stand, the second becomes indispensable; — - 
that if Peter came from the East in the reign of Claudius, 
he must have made more than one journey from there; 
in fact, so many are supposed necessary by some, that 
they are no longer called " journey" but "excursions," 
by the writers who speak of them. 

These two extraordinary suppositions, however, were 
not long unopposed by the Roman clergy, as being, 
(however well intended by Baronius) calculated to bring 
their church into disrepute with all the educated portion 
of the Christian world. The celebrated Father Antonio 
Pagi (a.d. 1699), a Franciscan monk, and the most 
learned as well as partial of Baronius' s commentators, 
candidly declares, that the first of these suppositions is 
contrary to Scripture, — " a point," he says, " to which 
Baronius had not sufficiently attended," — and that the 
second of them is "absurd." — (See his Index). He in- 
forms us that Father Papebroche, the Jesuit, and the 
Abbe de Longuerue, both names that command the 
highest respect in the Roman church, told him that they 
agreed with him on these points, and he refers us to the 
opinions of Baluze and Yalesius, as exactly representing 
his own. — (See Baronii Annales, vol. i. a.d. 45, notes.) 

Father Calmet (a.d. 1757) says, that even before his 
time, the suppositions of Baronius had been abandoned 
by the Roman clergy as untenable. "As to saying 
that Peter lived twenty-five years at Rome as bishop, 
that is a notion that people do not now pretend to 
justify; besides, it is but very partially entertained." — 
(Quand on dit que St. Pierre a siege a Rome pendant 
vingt-cinq ans, c'est deja une chose que Ton ne pretend 
pas soutenir avec opiniatrete' et qui n'est point avoue 
detout le monde. — Preliminary Dissertation on 1 Peter.) 

Nicholas Thoynard, a very distinguished Roman- 
catholic writer, and friend of Cardinal Noris, admits 
this also, and hints pretty plainly that their inconsistency 

m 2 






164 EUSEBIUS. 



with Scripture is against them. " Many of our church," 
says he, in his Notes upon Lactantius, " assert two jour- 
neys of Peter's to Rome, one under Claudius, and one 
under Nero. Others acknowledge only one, under Nero." 
And again : " But if that excursion of Peter's (ista Petri 
excursio) is condemned on account of its inconsistency 
with the Scriptural account of events as far as the 12th 
chapter of the Acts, then his first visit to Europe was in 
the reign of Nero." 

The Roman-catholic commentator on Petau's "Abrege 
Chronologique," says that the supposition of Baronius is 
attended with a good deal of difficulty (ce qui souffre 
de tres-grandes difficultes) and refers to Baluze, as enter- 
taining a more rational view of matters. Father Tille- 
mont (a.d. 1698) admits this also: "There is something," 
says he, in his Notes on Peter's History, " not easy to 
believe (Ilya quelque chose de difficile a croire) in what 
is said about Peter's going to Rome in 42, according to 
Eusebius and Jerome {i.e. Jerome's translation of Euse- 
bius), and being put in prison at Jerusalem in 44." 

Father Dupin (a.d. 1719) looks upon the story as 
so utterly without foundation, that he nowhere takes 
the least notice of it. 

Valesius (a.d. 1676) writes as follows on the subject : 
" Eusebius, indeed, in his Chronicon (i.e. in Jerome's 
translation of it), mentions a visit of Peter's to Rome in 
the second year of Claudius, which was the notion 
adopted by Baronius, Petau, and several others. But 
this notion is found to be refuted by the Acts of the 
Apostles, for in them it is clear that Peter remained 
constantly in Judaea and Syria until the last year of 
Agrippa's reign, and Agrippa died at Csesarea, after 
having imprisoned Peter at Jerusalem, as is recorded by 
St. Luke. Since, therefore, Agrippa died, as we are all 
agreed, in the fourth year of Claudius, Peter could not 
have gone to Rome prior to that year. This view is 
strongly corroborated by Apollonius, an ancient writer, 
who composed an able work against the heresy of Mon- 
tanus. He says that there was a tradition in his time 
that the dispersion of the apostles took place after the 



EUSEBIUS. 165 

twelfth year from the Ascension, our Lord himself hav- 
ing so commanded them, Bede also mentions this in 
his Commentary on the 13th Chapter of the Acts. But 
the author of the Alexandrian Chronicle makes Peter's 
visit to Rome still later." (Yal. in Euseb. ii. 16). 

Stephen Baluze (a.d. 1718), writes thus on this 
point : — " There are several very great difficulties (tot 
tantasque difficultates) connected with the notion of his 
having gone to Europe in the reign of Claudius, inas- 
much as it obliges us to suppose that he went there 
twice, and had two contests there with the Sama- 
ritan heretic, once under Claudius and again under 
Nero. How preposterous such a supposition as this is 
(Quae res quam absurda sit) when no ancient writer 
states it, those well know who are acquainted with this 
subject; for as Cardinal Baronius himself justly observes 
elsewhere, every one disregards as untrue, or worse 
(contemnitur) what a later writer states without the 
authority of some one preceding him." (Baluze in 
Lactant. ) 

Father Ceillier endeavours to transfer the responsi- 
bility of these absurd suppositions from Baronius to 
Jerome and the old Roman catalogue, as well as to the 
lost work of Eusebius, translated by Jerome. It will be 
seen, however, in a future page, that these writings are 
exempt from all such responsibility, and afford not the 
slightest pretext for these singular suppositions of Car- 
dinal Baronius. " I know that several able men," says 
Ceillier, " suppose two voyages of St. Peter to Rome, 
and that they place the first of these in the second year 
of the reign of the Emperor Claudius. They depend for 
the truth of this statement upon Eusebius and St. Jerome 
{i.e. Jerome's translation of Eusebius), and upon an 
ancient catalogue of the Roman Pontiffs, published by 
Father Boucher. But it is not perhaps very difficult to 
show that upon that point Eusebius and St. Jerome 
have {i.e. Jerome's translation of Eusebius has) deviated 
from the truth of history, to which they {i.e. the transla- 
tor) did not sufficiently attend." He here points out some 
of the inconsistencies of the story, and then proceeds 



166 EUSEBIUS. 

thus : " A learned member of our church of the last 
century (Stephen Baluze), conjectures, with much 
appearance of truth, that the notion which has been 
entertained for some time about St. Peter's having 
governed the Church of Rome during twenty-five years, 
has arisen from mistaking the twenty-five years employed 
by the apostles separately in proclaiming the gospel 
throughout the world, for the time that St. Peter 
governed the Church of Rome by himself; and this 
writer has no hesitation in abandoning, upon this point, 
Eusebius and St. Jerome (i.e. Jerome's translation of 
Eusebius), to adopt the opinion of Lactantius, who 
admitted but one of the voyages to Rome, and who places 
that, not under Claudius but under Nero ; and this also 
is the view of the matter that I adopt." — (Ceill. vol. i. 
c. 9.) 

The Dominican Fathers in their " Bibliotheque Sacree" 
(a.d. 1822), are very short and explicit as to the hypo- 
thesis of Baronius about the reign of Claudius and the 
Five-and-Twenty years : "What is certain is, that Peter 
did not go to Rome until the reign of Nero." (Ce qu'il y 
a de certain c'est qu'il n'alla a Rome que sous l'empire 
de Neron. — Art. Antioch.) 

Bishop Pearson, and Mr. Baratier, to whom we are 
referred by the writer in the Times as the very best 
authorities upon the subject of Peter's having left the 
East, are equally explicit upon this point. " I do not 
see any reason for thinking," says Bishop Pearson, " that 
Peter came into Europe in the reign of Claudius." — 
(Dissert, i. c. 8.) " This notion," says Mr. Baratier, 
" the learned have long since shown to be untrue, and 
contrary alike to the facts of history and to the testimony 
of the ancients." (Sententiam hanc falsam esse et 
contra historise fidem, antiquorumque testimonia peccare, 
jamdudum ostenderunt Eruditi. c. i.) 

Thus it is clear that the hypothesis about the reign 
of Claudius has long ago fallen to the ground, and that 
even the Roman clergy themselves do not now pretend 
to say that Peter came at that time into Europe. But 
besides this, it has been seen that the Greek passage we 



EUSEBIUS. 167 

have been considering (Euseb. ii. 14) does not bear the 
sense which Father M c Corry and the Correspondent in 
the Times seek to force upon it, nor afford the slightest 
evidence of St. Peter's having ever at any time aban- 
doned his mission to the lost sheep of the house of 
Israel. 



III. 

The next passage to be considered occurs ii. 15, and is 
that upon which most stress is laid ; yet in it the histo- 
rian of Cappadocia merely tells us that the Jewish notion 
about Babylon meaning Koine in Isaiah and the ancient 
prophets, was extended by some of the Jewish converts 
of the East, in his day, to Peter's First Epistle— that 
" Babylon" was supposed by these parties to stand for 
" Rome" in that Epistle as well as in Isaiah — and that 
there was therefore a supposition among them that Peter 
must have been in Europe when he wrote it. The 
language of Eusebius distinctly implies that this was 
but an on-dit, and a partial one, — that no one could be 
sure it was true, — that he could not vouch for it, — nor 
was himself at all inclined to credit it. He thus ex- 
presses himself: " We hear it said (<j>aai) that this is 
the Mark whom Peter mentions in his First Epistle as 
with him at Babylon; which it is also the on-dit ($a<n, 
again) that he composed at Rome, and that he himself 
shows this — but the metaphor is too bold(r / oo7rt/cwr£ i oo*>) — 
by designating that city ' Babylon,' when he says, ' the 
church at Babylon where I am, which was founded on 
the same occasion as you were, salutes you, as does also 
my son Mark, who is here with me.' " Nothing can be 
more evident than it is that Eusebius does not here state 
that Peter wrote his Epistle at Rome, but only speaks of 
the supposition as an improbable on-dit of the fourth cen- 
tury ; nor do I now find any writer who pretends to say 
he does. Since, however, this passage, occurring in an 
historian of the highest credit, and being greatly misun- 
derstood, has, no doubt, had much weight with those 
Roman Catholics who entertain the conjecture of Euse- 



168 EUSEB1US. 

bins, about Peter's not having been put to death at 
Babylon, it will not perhaps be uninteresting or unhi- 
structive to examine thoroughly the circumstances of 
the on-dit which it records. 

St. Jerome in his " Commentary upon Isaiah," dis- 
tinctly mentions it as a Jewish saying that " Babylon" 
meant " Rome" in Scripture ; and mentions it moreover as 
a saying that existed exclusively among the more carnal- 
minded of the Jews (not assuredly such of them as our 
Lord's apostles), and as beingwithout a. shadow of founda- 
tion in fact, — nay, as a nonsensical supposition which no 
one could entertain. " The Jews," says Jerome, "under- 
stand Isaiah xiv. 2 in a carnal and worldly sense, because 
after they returned from Babylon, they could not say 
that that which is here mentioned had taken place. The 
Babylonians who had enslaved them had not been in 
their turn enslaved by them. The Jews had not beaten 
the Babylonians in battle, nor taken possession of their 
houses, nor employed them as menials. They are there- 
fore reduced to think in their own foolish way (juxta 
fabulas suas) that the prediction must have reference to 
the Roman empire; and that when they conquer the 
Romans, it will then be true that nations to whom the 
Jews were slaves will have become slaves to the Jews. 
But though they deceive themselves with these literal 
interpretations of prophetic language, and the false hopes 
they give rise to, who, after all, will believe them 
that eome is called babylon (Quis eis concedet ut 
Roma vocetur Babylon?) and Nebuchadnezzar a Roman 
King?" — (St. Jerome on Isaiah, chap. xiv. 2.) It is 
unnecessary to repeat that St. Peter and the apostles 
were of all men the most unlikely to have in any of their 
writings afforded the least countenance to such a worldly- 
minded interpretation of the Scriptures. 

The report which applies this Jewish saying to the 
apostle's language, and of which we have not the slightest 
trace in all antiquity except in this passage of Eusebius 
and its translations, was looked upon by two writers of the 
middle ages, and subsequently by Baronius, Bellarmine, 
and some others, as not improbable under two mistaken 



EUSEBIUS. 169 

impressions: 1, that it was stated by Eusebius, on the 
authority of Papias v as existing in the earliest days of 
the church ; and 2, that it was the opinion of Eusebius 
himself and of all the Fathers who succeeded him. It 
is, however, now in every one's power to see that both 
these suppositions are, as happily every one now admits, 
utterly groundless. Eusebius does not give the report 
as existing in the earlier days of the church, nor on the 
authority of Papias (see the section on Papias), he only 
says that it existed in his own day (£. e. in the fourth 
century). He also says that he did not believe it — that 
the Jewish metaphor upon which it depended appeared 
to him to be too far-fetched to leave the story any pro- 
bability. Nor does any one of the Fathers repeat this 
on-dit, or say one word in vindication of it, although 
almost every one of them comment upon this First Epistle 
of St. Peter. This is what Father Tillemont adverts to 
when he says : " Bishop Pearson attributes this notion to 
many of the Fathers. It is to be regretted that he has not 
mentioned who they were. He did not, however, himself 
entertain it." (Pearson attribue ce sentiment en general 
a beaucoup de Peres. Je voudrais qu'il les eut marques. 
II ne les suit pas neanmoins. — Tillem., art. Peter.) 
Jerome, indeed, who was a Latin writer, fell into the 
error of supposing that Eusebius, who wrote in Greek, 
stated the fact in question upon his own authority, 
and accordingly where Jerome professes to give a 
translation of the passage from Eusebius, the state- 
ment is that Peter did use this Jewish metaphor, and 
not that there was a rumour of his having done so. 
But everyone admits that Jerome was (as he himself 
acknowledges) very inexpert in translating Greek, and 
that he in this place only made one of his not unusual 
blunders respecting the Greek text of Eusebius. In 
common fairness, then, we cannot cite Jerome as autho- 
rity on the subject, since the evidence of his mistake is 
before us, unless it be to prove that the rumour was so 
very partial when it did exist, that it did not reach 
Jerome in the next generation except through this inci- 
dental solitary statement of Eusebius, a writer in Cappa- 






1 70 EUSEBIUS. 

docia, wholly unconnected with the church of Rome. We 
have, however, abundant evidence that Jerome himself 
gave no countenance to the story even when he supposed 
he had it upon the authority of Eusebius ; for in none of 
his original writings, not even in his criticisms upon 
this very Epistle of St. Peter, does he so much as make 
the slightest allusion to its existence ; and in his com- 
mentary on the prophet Haggai (ch. ii.), in a passage 
already quoted in the section on Irenaeus, when speaking 
of the cities in which there were churches in Peter's 
day, he mentions Babylon as a matter of course, and as 
being the city where Peter lived, without the least 
allusion to the Jewish saying which some of the less 
spiritual-minded of the Jewish converts connected with 
that name. 

An Englishman in the eighth century — our own Bede 
— is the first after Eusebius who adverts to this story, 
but he only repeats the erroneous Latin translation of 
St. Jerome, not the on-dit of Eusebius. About two or 
three centuries after Bede, an obscure writer named 
(Ecumenius, is supposed by some to have written a 
book, in which he alluded to it ; and no one has 
been able to discover any other mention of it in 
the writings of the ancients. Scarcely any one now, 
therefore, seeks to justify this interpretation of the 
apostle's language, except some of the Roman clergy 
who are still deceived as to its having had the sanction 
of the Fathers, and as to its having been adopted in the 
days of Papias. It is almost needless to add that in the 
countries adjoining Babylonia the Christian commen- 
tators never understood "Babylon" to mean Rome. 
" The Syriac and Arabic writers," says Adam Clarke, 
" understood it literally as denoting a town in the East ; 
and if we are to be guided by opinion, an oriental writer 
is surely as good authority on the present question as a 
European." — (Clarke on 1 Peter.) 

The groundlessness of the suppositions about Papias 
and the Fathers having been discovered, and the import- 
ance of maintaining the on-dit in connexion with the 
present controversy having been felt by some of the 






EUSEBIUS. 171 

writers in communion with the Church of Rome, two 
new suggestions were offered by Baronius and others 
of them, for the purpose of investing the story with 
something like probability. First, it was said that Rome 
is called "Babylon" in the Revelations of St. John; and 
secondly, that Babylon itself was a very unlikely place 
for Peter, the most active of the apostles for the circum- 
cision, to have gone to. 

With regard to the first of these suggestions, it is to 
be observed that St. John does not do what is imputed 
to him. He nowhere uses the mere term " Babylon " to 
designate Rome. The expression he employs is invari- 
ably "Babylon the Great" (BaSvXuv rj fueyaXri) and this 
obviously for the purpose of distinction ; the invariable- 
ness of the expression being rendered the more remark- 
able by the frequency of its recurrence — almost in suc- 
cessive verses. The English version does not always 
exhibit the fact I now speak of, but every one who reads 
the original is aware of it. It is, therefore, a mistake 
to suppose that St. John expected Rome to be under- 
stood by the mere name " Babylon" in the Revelations. 
He does not. The passages clearly prove the contrary — 
clearly prove that he did not consider that name alone 
sufficient to designate it, — clearly prove that for that 
purpose St. Peter must have written at least "The church 
at Babylon the Great salutes you." But that is not all. 
Even if St. John had attached this mystical sense to the 
mere name of Babylon in that mystical book of Revela- 
tions, how could we have thence inferred, without 
absurdity, that the word must bear the same mystical 
sense in all the other books of the New Testament ? By 
" Egypt," St. John understood Jerusalem in this mys- 
tical sense in the same book, and tells us that others 
also used that name " Egypt " to designate " the city 
where our Lord was crucified." — (Rev. xi. 8.) But 
how can the Roman clergy hence pretend with any 
show of reason, that " Egypt " stands for Jerusalem in 
the gospels and epistles? Surely there is neither critical 
accuracy nor common sense, to say nothing of piety, in 
this mode of dealing with the Scriptures. But, as has, 






172 EUSEBIUS. 

been stated, St. John nowhere calls Rome merely 
u Babylon," nor considered that this term would have 
sufficiently designated the Capital of the Gentiles. 

As to the second suggestion, so far was Babylon from 
being a very unlikely place for Peter to have gone to, 
that it can easily be shown to have been by a great deal 
the most likely — nay, that it is in the last degree 
unlikely that he should not have gone there, even if we 
had not his own express and solemn record of his 
having gone. In the first place, there was no quarter 
of the then known world, except Judasa, in which there 
were so many Jews and so many synagogues in Peter's 
time as in Babylon and the surrounding provinces. 
Josephus, who was Peter's contemporary, and a Jew, 
speaking of the Jews that were at Babylon about his 
own time, says in one place that they were there " in 
great numbers," (evSaicai trXriOog rjvIovSaaov — Antiq.xv.2.) 
And in another, that there were several myriads of them 
permanently settled there as emigrants, (ov yap oXiyai 

juivpiaSzQ rov^e \aov 7repi Tr}vf3a^>v\d)vi avairMKiadr](Jav — Antiq. 

xv. 3. ) The " myriad " was ten thousand. He also relates 
that there was upon one occasion, about half a century 
before he wrote, such an immense population of Jews 
together in Seleucia alone, which was the new capital of 
that country, about forty miles from Babylon, that 
although nearly fifty thousand of them were then 
slaughtered in that city by the factions there, yet such 
of them as escaped through the compassion of the 
neutral Seleucians, and such of the other Jews of 
Babylonia as had rendered themselves obnoxious, were 
still able to hold out the strong cities of Neerda and 
Nisibis against the united force of those Seleucians and 
Babylonians that were opposed to them. — (Josephus, 
Antiquit. xviii. 9.) In another passage, when speak- 
ing of the few Jews who returned with Ezra from 
Babylon in the olden time, he says : " But the whole 
people of the Israelites remained where they were. 
Whence it has happened, that there are but two tribes 
subject to the Romans in Asia and Europe. The ten 
tribes still exist beyond the Euphrates to this day, — 



EUSEBIUS. 173 

infinite myriads, whose numbers it is no longer possible 

for US to Calculate," (/ui^iaStg cnreipoi Kai api6jj.a> yvwaOr^vat 

fj.7] SwafjLzvai — Antiq. xi. 5.) Philo, another Jew, and 
also a contemporary of St. Peter, describes the Jews 
at Babylon in his own days as appearing to constitute 
almost one-half of the inhabitants, (wc rwv avOiyzvwv fx-n 
ttoAXw tivi Soicetv kXaTTovaOai — Phil, de Virtutibus.) On 
another occasion, this writer speaks of them as the 
chief occupants of Babylon and its neighbourhood, and 
as being so numerous that Petronius the Syrian Prefect 
was deterred by their numbers from withdrawing, as 
Caligula had ordered him, one half of the Roman forces 
from the Euphrates to Judaea, to insist on the Emperor's 
statue being placed in the temple at Jerusalem (ibid.); 
and in another passage he says, that the Jews were, in 
his own day, " in very great numbers" {irafirikriQuQ — ibid.) 
in that as well as in all the rest of the cities in that 
part of Asia. "If we except Palestine," says Adam 
Clarke, " there was no country in the world where the 
Jews were so numerous and so powerful as in the pro- 
vince of Babylonia, in which they had their two cele- 
brated seats of learning, Nehardea and Susa." With 
these accounts of the Jews in the Babylonian district 
during the apostolic times, the other numerous indica- 
tions that we have perfectly agree. Of all the Jewish 
records, for instance, the two Talmuds — that of Babylon 
and that of Jerusalem — are looked upon by the Jews 
themselves as the most important; and of those the 
Talmud of Jerusalem is contained in one volume while the 
Talmud of Babylon, supposed to have been a work of the 
second century, and considered by the Jews as of higher 
authority than the other, extends to no less than fourteen 
thick folio volumes. Surely such a fact alone is evidence 
of the importance of the Jewish colony at Babylon, even 
as late as the second century. But further : Babylon 
was always considered the metropolis of the Jews that 
did not live in Judaea. This fact is not only recognised 
by all the learned, but is distinctly stated in the 
Talmud of Babylon: "The Babylonians," says Joseph 
Scaliger, " were the head of the Asiatic Dispersion, as is 



174 EUSEBIUS. 

clear from innumerable passages of the Talmud." And 
we cannot wonder that it was so. The Jews here were 
the original "lost sheep of the house of Israel," men- 
tioned by the ancient prophets and our Saviour, — the 
nucleus, as it were, around which all the rest of the 
Dispersion formed ; and what can be more natural than 
that the metropolis of the dispersed Jews should have 
been in Jews the most populous of their cities. One 
other illustration will suffice. The mere Jewish escort that 
accompanied the sacred treasures which were annually 
sent from Babylon to Jerusalem, amounted in the time of 
Peter and Josephus to forty, fifty, sixty thousand men, 
and upwards (77-0 A A<u pvpiaSsg avOpioTrw — Josephus, Antiq. 
xviii. 9). Whereas, on the other hand, the highest num- 
ber of Jews that we ever hear of at the Gentile capital 
in the apostolic times, or indeed at any other period, 
does not appear to have much exceeded eight thou- 
sand (Josephus, Antiq. xvii. 11); so few, that they were 
all easily banished from the city whenever their conduct 
made this necessary. For one instance of this consult 
Suetonius (Tib. 36), Tacitus (Ann. ii. 85), and Jose- 
phus (Antiq. xviii. 3). Another instance occurs in 
Suetonius (Claud. 25), and in the Acts of the Apostles 
(xviii. 2). How then can any one pretend to say that 
in this particular Babylon was not a much more likely 
place for Peter to have gone to than Rome? All that 
Baronius and Bellarmine say in reply to these historical 
facts is, that after the massacre at Seleucia of the Jews 
that had rendered themselves obnoxious to the factions 
of that city, about forty or fifty years before Philo or 
Josephus wrote, it was not likely that there should have 
been Jews enough left alive afterwards in any part of 
Babylonia, during Peter's life, to have made it at 
all reasonable to suppose that " Babylon" could have 
meant Babylon in his epistle ! " As Peter speaks of the 
church at Babylon," says Baronius, " and as this cannot 
possibly be understood of Babylon in Assyria, inasmuch 
as it is clear from Josephus that the Jews who lived in 
the Assyrian Babylon were expelled and slaughtered in 
the reign of Caligula, we cannot possibly avoid the 



EUSEBIUS. 175 

conclusion, that Peter understood Rome when he wrote 
Babylon." (Bar. in Annal.) 

After what has just been stated about the subsequent 
numbers of the Jews in Babylon, both from Josephus 
and Philo, another of Peter's contemporaries, this argu- 
ment requires no answer. As, however, Baronius was 
mistaken as to the expulsion from Babylon, and as to 
the total slaughter of the Babylonian or even of the 
Seleucian Jews, I append Josephus's own account of 
this transaction, by which it will be seen that he speaks 
of " the whole nation of the Jews in that quarter" as still 
existing after the massacre of the 50,000, which massacre, 
moreover, it must not be forgotten, had occurred nearly a 
quarter of a century before Peter is at all likely to have 
gone to Babylon, — and occurred in opposition to the 
wishes of the Parthian government, which always favoured 
the Jews. " They (the Jews and Gentiles of Babylon) 
were," says Josephus, " almost always at variance, by 
reason of the contrariety of" their laws; and which party 
soever grew boldest before the other, they assaulted 
the other; and at this time in particular it was that 
the Babylonians attacked the Jews, which made those 
Jews so vehemently to resent the injuries they received 
from the Babylonians, that being neither able to fight 
with them nor bearing to live with them, they went 
to Seleucia, the principal city of those parts, which was 
built by Seleucus Nicator. It was inhabited by many 
of the Macedonians, but by more of the Grecians ; not 
a few of the Syrians also dwelt there ; and thither went 
some of the Jews, and lived there five years without 
any misfortunes. But in the sixth year, a pestilence 
came upon those at Babylon, which occasioned new 
removals of men's habitations out of that city; and 
because they came to Seleucia, it happened that a still 
heavier calamity came upon them on that account, 
which I am going to relate immediately. Now the way 
of living of the people of Seleucia, who were Greeks and 
Syrians, was commonly quarrelsome and full of dis- 
cords, though the Greeks were too hard for the Syrians. 
When, therefore, the Jews were come thither and dwelt 



176 EUSEBIUS. 

among them, there arose a sedition, and the Syrians 
were too hard for the other by the assistance of the 
Jews, who are men that despise dangers, and very ready 
to fight upon any occasion. Now when the Greeks had 
the worst in this sedition, and saw that they had but 
one way of recovering their former authority, and that 
was if they could prevent the agreement between the 
Jews and the Syrians, they every one discoursed with 
such of the Syrians as were formerly their acquaint- 
ance, and promised they would be at peace and friend- 
ship with them. Accordingly they gladly agreed so to 
do ; and when this was done by the principal men of 
both nations, they soon agreed to a reconciliation; and 
when they were so agreed, they both knew that the 
great design of such their union would be their com- 
mon hatred to the Jews. Accordingly they fell upon 
them, and slew about fifty thousand of them; yes, the 
Jews there were all destroyed, except such as could escape 
by the compassion which their friends and neighbours 
afforded them in order to let them get away. These 
retired to Ctesiphon, a Grecian city, and situated near 
to Seleucia, where the king of Parthia lives in winter, 
every year, and where the greatest part of his riches 
are deposited; but the Jews had here no security, as 
the Seleucians had but little respect for their king. 
Now the whole nation of the Jews in that quarter {irav 
to rySi- lovSauov eOuog) were in fear both of the Baby- 
lonians and of the Seleucians, because all the Syrians 
that live in those places agreed with the Seleucians in ! 
the war against the Jews; so that the most of them 
(wc to ttoXv) gathered themselves together and went to 
Neerda and Nisibis, and obtained security there by the 
strength of those cities ; besides which, the inhabitants 
of these cities, who are a great many, were all warlike J 
men ; and this was the state of the Jews in Babylonia." 
(Josephus, Antiq. xviii. 9.) I shall here merely draw 
attention to the fact, that the whole of the Macedonian I 
population in Seleucia were favourable to the Jews; { 
that only a portion of the Jewish population were 
obliged to take refuge in the two strong cities men- 

I 



EUSEBIUS. 177 

tioned ; and that both then and afterwards the Parthian 
government, as I have said, afforded all the protection 
in their power to the Jews. 

In the second place, there was as much travelling to 
and fro between Babylon and Jerusalem in the days of 
the apostles as there was between any other two neigh- 
bouring cities in the then known world, for the provinces 
of Judaea and Babylonia were separated only by the 
Euphrates. Between Babylon and Antioch (the capital 
of Syria, another province adjoining Babylonia) the 
intercourse of all kinds was absolutely incessant (as may 
be seen in Diodorus Siculus, Josephus, Quintus Curtius, 
Strabo, &c), quite as much so as between Jerusalem 
and Antioch, the distance in the former case being but 
little more than that in the latter, and the means of 
access much easier ; for the Euphrates with its navigable 
current extended the whole way from Syria to Babylon. 
The distance that the caravans had to travel from Jeru- 
salem to Babylon was only the same as the distance 
from Jerusalem to Antioch, these three cities, Babylon, 
Jerusalem, and Antioch, the capitals of three adjoining 
provinces, being almost equidistant from each other, and 
occupying, as it were, the three angles of an equilateral 
triangle, with Palmyra (or Tadmor) in the centre of the 
triangle. Whoever attends to this, and to the facilities 
indispensable in the nature of things, for the transmis- 
sion of the large quantities of merchandize, and of the 
large bodies of men which, for religious and military, as 
well as for commercial purposes, we find constantly 
passing and repassing between Babylon and Jerusalem, 
and reads at the same time of the constant letters, pre- 
sents, messengers, and even mere compliments that passed 
between the authorities of these two cities in or about the 
time of the apostles, will see at once, without any further 
argument, that there is not the slightest pretext for 
supposing that Babylon was so remote or inaccessible as 
to make it unreasonable to believe the plain statement 
of the Scriptures when they tell us that Peter went 
there. But in addition to all this very obvious reason- 

N 



178 EUSEBIUS. 

ing, let us hear what St. Chrysostom, who was a native 
and resident of Antioch, says upon the proximity of 
Babylon to the Levant, and of the caravan route from 
that city, in his own day (a.d. 407), which was after 
Babylon had greatly fallen away even from what it was 
in Peter's time. We cannot desire a better authority. 
" The land of Judsea," says St. Chrysostom, " that is, 
all Palestine from Egypt to the Euphrates, lies on the 
bank opposite to Babylonia, which was Abraham's native 
country ; and the river flows between the two lands, a 
mutual boundary to both of them. Since, then, he 
(Abraham) was not from Palestine, but came from the 
other side of the river, from Babylonia, his name was 
derived from the spot and act, and he was called ' The 
one who passes over/ because he came from the oppo- 
site bank of the Euphrates." And again, after speaking 
of the distance between Babylon and the Levant, St. 
Chrysostom thus proceeds : " The road is no longer in 
the same state as it was (in Abraham's time), for now 
it is divided into a succession of stations, and towns, and 
villas, and the pedestrian meets several fellow-travellers, 
which contributes to security quite as much as station, 
or town, or villa does. And besides this, the local 
governors of the towns levy men of superior bodily 
strength, and professionally skilled in the use of the 
lance and sling, and appoint captains over them, and 
employ them for no other purpose than that alone of 
attending to the safety of the highways. Another 
source of protection is, that there are sheds (onetifiara) 
built a thousand paces distant from each other along 
the whole way, in which watchmen are placed at night, 
whose vigilance and care are the greatest check upon 
the robbers. But in the days of Abraham there were 
none of these things to be seen,— no continuous villas, 
no towns, no stations, no caravansaries, no fellow-tra- 
vellers," &c. &c. (Chrysos. ad Stagirium, lib. ii. c. 6.) 
The following is from Father Calmet's Dictionary to 
the Bible : " The most extensive dominion of the He- 
brews," says Calmet, u was from the river of Egypt, 



EUSEBIUS. 179 

south, to the river Euphrates, north-east North- 
ward, the Hebrew power extended not only along the 
western bank of the Euphrates, but occasionally included 
towns on the eastern side." (Calmet, Fragment. 589.) 
Again : " Probably the major part by far of the Israel- 
ites who revisited their native land we^re from Babylon 
(Ezra, ii. 2 ; viii. 1) ; this caravan, however, did not take 
the northern route, but crossed the desert south of Tad- 
mor." (Fragm. 589.) And again, "Josephus," says 
Calmet, "places it (Tadmor, or Palmyra) two days' jour- 
ney from the Upper Syria, one day's journey from the 
Euphrates, and six days' journey from Babylon." (Cal- 
met. Diet., Palmyra.) With this information before us, 
and we have much more to the same effect in these and 
other writers, equally accepted by the Roman Catholics, 
how can any one pretend to say that Peter might not 
just as well have gone to Babylon from Jerusalem as 
to Antioch from Jerusalem, and we read in the New 
Testament also that he went to Antioch. As to Rome, 
the distance from Jerusalem to Rome, either by land or 
sea, in those days, was considerably upwards of two thou- 
sand miles, — much more than four times as far as from 
Jerusalem to Babylon ! Not only, therefore, with regard 
to the Jewish population of Rome, but also as far as its 
relations of distance and intercourse with Jerusalem are 
concerned, the scriptural account of Peter's mission is 
by far more probable than that partial on-dit of the 
fourth century alluded to by Eusebius, which represents 
this apostle not to have gone to Babylon. 

In the third place (as has been already observed in 
the section on Clemens Romanus), Babylon was plainly 
and specially indicated to all the twelve apostles by our 
Lord himself as the post of the more active and enter- 
prising of their party, when He told them to go to the 
Jewish rather than to the Gentile districts of the earth, 
and to convert the Gentiles, as much as possible, through 
the Jews. " Go, rather," said our blessed Lord, " to the 
lost sheep of the house of Israel." (Matt, x.) Now, as 
there were some Jews almost everywhere, but more of 

n 2 



180 EUSEBIUS. 

them In some places than in others, no one denies that 
our Lord here meant that the apostles should bestow most 
of their personal attention upon those countries and cities 
in which the Jews resided in the greatest numbers ; and 
since the apostles could not have done this, — could not 
have been said to go rather to the Jews than to the 
Gentiles, if they selected the districts in which there 
were the fewest of the race, and left unvisited the dis- 
tricts in which the Jewish population was the largest, — 
it therefore clearly follows, that Babylon was specially 
and distinctly pointed out by our Lord himself to Peter 
as his peculiar post on this occasion ; a consideration of 
immense importance in this inquiry, and which has been 
wholly overlooked by Baronius and Bellarmine. Nor 
was it alone because Babylon, beyond all comparison, 
exceeded Rome in its Jewish population, that it was 
pointed out to Peter in our Lord's own words. Babylon 
was also the capital — the original settlement of " the lost 
sheep of the house of Israel" — that first colony of the 
captive Jews to whom the great prophets of old had often 
and emphatically applied that memorable denomination. 
They were "the lost sheep" — "the scattered sheep" — 
"the scattered flock" of Jeremiah, who were to be 
" brought again to their own folds." ( Jer. xxiii. 2 ; 1. 6 
& 17; also 1 Peter, ii. 25.) They were what Ezekiel 
called " the flock that had no shepherd ;" " the sheep that 
were to be sought out;" that were "to be fed;" that 
were " again to feed upon the high mountains of Israel." 
(Ezekiel xxxiv. 5, 11, &c. ; also, John xxi. 16 & 17.) 
Nothing, I think, can be more evident than that when 
our Lord told Peter to go to the lost sheep of the house 
of Israel rather than to any other people of the earth, 
he did not mean by those words that he should go to 
Rome. Thus, in whatever way we look at this question, 
we see that Babylon was not only not an unlikely place 
for Peter to have gone to, but that it is in the last degree 
unlikely that he should not have gone there, even if we 
had never heard of his having gone. 

As some have been led to adopt the rumour of the 



EUSEBIUS. 181 

fourth century, under the unaccountable impression that 
in Peter's day Babylon was no longer in existence, or 
at least was so much dilapidated as to be uninhabitable, 
I adduce the following authorities on that point, from 
which it will be seen that Babylon was then (about 
a.d. 50), very much the same as it ever was, except in 
the diminished number of its inhabitants, which was now 
scarce one-half of what it had been — in the ruined state 
of its public buildings, many of which, however, were 
in ruins even when Alexander entered it — and in its 
being no longer the constant residence of a court. There 
were still, it will be seen, those immense walls, the area 
of 225 square miles (a little province in itself) that they 
enclosed, the people necessary to till all the arable por- 
tion of that land, which was so extensive that it could 
maintain the inhabitants of the city when these were at 
their highest number, — the manufacturers and tradesmen 
who supplied the agricultural population, — the houses 
for all these people to live in, which covered eleven or 
twelve square miles of the whole enclosure, and were 
being still constantly constructed as there was a demand 
for them, — the places of worship, the markets, the courts 
of law, — the royal preserves and parks, still kept up there 
on account of the great height and sound condition of 
the city walls, — the establishment of officers and attend- 
ants connected with those parks and preserves, as well 
as with the courts of law and the revenues, — a Parthian 
garrison constantly kept there, the bridges still spanning 
that mighty river, the splendid remains of ruined palaces, 
and one in very good repair, an immemorial temple 
crumbling to the dust, and gardens with vaulted terraces 
carried high into the air, a graceful and stupendous 
structure, that even in these apostolic days overtopped the 
Avails of Babylon with the flowing foliage of a thousand 
years; and all this within forty miles of the populous 
and flourishing, though less extensive, city of Seleucia ! 
Diodorus Siculus, a contemporary of St. Peter's, who 
flourished throughout the first century, says of Babylon 
in his own day: " The palaces and other public build- 



182 EUSEBIUS. 

ings time has partly obliterated, and partly laid in ruins. 

For comparatively only a small part of what is called 

Babylon is taken up with the houses of the inhabitants ; 

the greatest portion of the space within the walls (which 

are sixty miles in circuit) is employed for agricultural 

purposes." (Dio. Sic. ii. 9.) 

Strabo, another contemporary of Peter's, that died 

about a.d. 25, describing its condition as he saw it, 
writes thus : " The bridge across the Caprus is close to 
Seleucia and Babylon. Babylon itself is in a plain, and 
has a wall about sixty miles round, thirty -two feet thick, 
and seventy-five feet high. These walls are reckoned 
among the seven wonders of the world, as well as the 
hanging gardens, which form a square, and measure about 
400 feet every way. These gardens are constructed 
with terraces, that are raised with vaults over one 
another, &c. ; they are situated upon the banks of the 
river. The tomb (by some called 4 the tower/ by 
others ' the temple') of Belus is also situated there, now 
in ruins. They say that it was pulled down by 
Xerxes. It was originally a square pyramid, &c. 
Alexander the Great began to rebuild it, but he had not 
time to complete the undertaking. None of his suc- 
cessors interested themselves about it. Even the rest 
of the city (i. e. the ancient architecture) was neglected, 
and reduced to ruins, partly by the Persians, partly by 
time, and partly by the indifference of the Macedonians 
to such things, but chiefly when Seleucus Nicator for- 
tified Seleucia, on the Tigris, within forty miles of Ba- 
bylon. For he, and his successors, bestowed all their 
care upon this city, and removed the court there, and it 
is now a greater city than Babylon itself is. (Pliny 
tells us that Seleucia at this time contained 600,000 in- 
habitants ; and Calmet sets down a million and a quarter 
as the largest population that had ever occupied the 225 
square miles of Babylon.) The greater part of the im- 
mense space within the walls is neither occupied with 
houses nor inhabitants ; so that one may say of it what one 
of the comic poets said of Megalopolis, in Arcadia, ' the 
great city is a great wilderness.' On account of the 



EUSEBIUS. 183 

scarcity of timber there, they now build their houses with 
both rafters and posts of the palm-tree wood, and twist 
bands of reeds around the posts, which bands they then 
paint with oil-colours. They cover their doors with 
asphalt, and these are made high, as well as the houses, 
which are all constructed with arches in consequence of 
the scarcity of timber; for Babylon has little wood, 
except brushwood and the palm-tree ; and they do not 
use tiled roofs, as they have not much rain." — (Strabo, 
book xvi.) 

Pliny the elder, another of St. Peter's contemporaries 
(born a.d. 23, died a.d. 79), says: " Babylon, the ca- 
pital of the Chaldean nations, was for a long time famous 
throughout the whole world, in consequence of which 
the rest of Mesopotamia and Assyria, in which it occu- 
pied a circuit of sixty miles, was called Babylonia. . . . 
The temple of Jupiter Belus is still to be seen there ; 
but the city has no longer the population it used to have, 
having been drained of it by the proximity of Seleucia, 
which was built by Mcator for that very purpose." 
(Plin. Hist. Nat., lib. vi. c. 30.) 

Plutarch, who was a young man when Peter was at 
Babylon (born a.d. 50, died a.d. 120), speaking of 
Crassus, who was in those countries only about forty 
years before that apostle was born, says : " Among the 
many errors which Crassus committed in this (Parthian) 
war, the first, and not the least, was his returning so soon 
into Syria. He ought to have gone forward, and 
strengthened himself with the accession of Babylon and 
Seleucia, cities (iroXeig) always at enmity with the Par- 
thians ; instead of which he gave the enemy abundant 
time to prepare themselves," &c. &c, (Crassus, xvii.) 
And, again : "In what raptures would the Komans have 
been if Crassus could have written to them from Ba- 
bylon that he was victorious ; and if he had proceeded 
from thence through Media, Persia," &c. (Niciae cum 
Crass. Compar.) 

Quintus Curtius, who is supposed to have lived about 
the time of the apostles, writes as follows of his own 
times: " There is room for carriages to pass each other, 



184 EUSEBIUS. 

as we hear, upon these walls in safety. . . . The houses 
are not built close up to the walls, but with an interval 
of about an acre of land to each house ; and even the 
whole of the city is not taken up with houses. These 
cover only about eleven or twelve miles of it, nor do 
they adjoin each other; because, I suppose, it is thought 
safer that they should stand in isolated positions. All 
the rest of the area within the walls, they still plant and 
cultivate, that in case of siege the land within the city 
might maintain the inhabitants. There is a stone bridge 
across the river, &c. &c. Near the castle are those 
wonders which are so often celebrated by the Greek 
poets : gardens elevated in the air, consisting of entire 
groves of trees, growing as high as the tops of the 
towers (150 feet) marvellously beautiful and pleasant 
from their height and shade. The whole weight of them 
is sustained and borne up by huge pillars, upon which 
there is a floor of square stone that both sustains the 
earth that lies deep upon the pillar, and also the cisterns 
with which it is watered. The trees that grow upon this 
are many of them twelve feet in circumference, and every- 
thing is as fruitful as if it grew on the natural ground ; 
and although process of time destroys things made by 
mortal hands, and also even the works of nature, yet 
these terraces, although weighed down with so much 
earth and so many trees, still remain unshaken, held up 
by seventy broad walls, about eleven feet distant from 
each other. When we see these trees from a distance, 
they seem to be a wood growing upon a mountain.' ' 
(Quintus Curt. v. 1.) 

Pausanius (a.d. 170), about a century after Peter was 
there, says : " The temple of Belus is still to be seen in 
Babylon, but of Babylon itself — that Babylon which 
was the most mighty city that the sun ever shone on 
in his course — there is no longer anything worth men- 
tioning, except its gigantic walls." — (Pausanias, Descrip. 
Gr., viii. 33.) 

When the Emperors Trajan and Sever us entered 
Parthia, they went to Babylon. Trajan had to take it 



EUSEBIUS. 185 

by force of arms from the Parthian garrison, a.d. Ill ; 
but when Severus came up, a.d. 200, the garrison had 
abandoned it, and the gates were opened to him. These 
facts are recorded by Dio Cassius and Eutropius. 

Eutropius (viii. 3) in relating the victories on the 
Euphrates over the Parthians gained by Trajan, about 
forty years after Peter's martyrdom, says : " Seleucia, 
Ctesiphon, and Babylon, he took and garrisoned (vicit 
ac tenuit) ; and reduced Armenia, Assyria, and Mesopo- 
tamia, to the condition of mere provinces." 

Dio Cassius (lxviii. 26, &c.) after saying that Trajan 
went round by Armenia, Mesopotamia, Msibis, and 
Adiabene, ("which country," says he, "is the part of 
Assyria about Nineveh,") proceeds thus: " Trajan and 
his army came to Babylon itself, under very little oppo- 
sition from the enemy ; for the Parthian forces had been 
wasted in civil wars, and were even then in a state of 
insubordination. There Trajan had an opportunity of 
seeing the asphalt of which the walls of Babylon are 
built, &c. &c. , . . Trajan fearing lest the Parthians 
should rebel against him, resolved to give them a king 
of their own. So when he came to Ctesiphon (not far 
from Babylon), he assembled all the Romans and Par- 
thians that were these in an immense plain, and after 
haranguing them from an elevated platform upon his 
victories, he appointed Parthamaspides to be their king, 
and put at the same time the diadem upon his head." 
And of Severus he says (lib. xxv. c. 9) : " When Severus 
reached Msibis, the Parthians retired without giving 
him battle, and went home; and Severus having con- 
structed rafts on the Euphrates, proceeded along the 
river, partly by water and partly on the banks, and in a 
very short time took possession of Seleucia and Babylon, 
which had been both abandoned. He afterwards took 
Ctesiphon, and allowed his soldiers to pillage it, killing 
an immense number, and making 100,000 prisoners." 

In the Fathers, also, Babylon is constantly mentioned, 
not only as existing in Peter's day, but for centuries 
afterwards, and as having a Christian and a Jewish 



186 EUSEBIUS. 

population. St. Chrysostom, for instance, mentions it 
as one of the cities whose churches were founded by St. 
Peter and the apostles at Jerusalem immediately after 
the Ascension. This eminent Father, in his 17th Homily 
on the Epistle to the Hebrews, says, when speaking of 
the temple at Jerusalem : " The Jews came there from 
the most distant places, not only from Babylon, but from 
Ethiopia also, and this is what Luke means when he 
says (Acts ii. 5, &c.), there were dwelling at Jeru- 
salem Jews, devout men out of every nation under 
heaven. . . . Parthians and Medes . . . the dwellers 
in Egypt," &c. 

Jerome (a.d. 420) writes: " I have learned from an 
Elamite who has just come out of that country, and is 
now living at Jerusalem, that there are still royal pre- 
serves within Babylon, and that wild beasts of every 
description can be kept in for the chase, in the immense 
area enclosed by the walls of that city." ( Jerom. Com- 
mentar. in Isaiae, c. xiii.) 

Theodoret (a.d. 459), one of the bishops on the 
Euphrates, says, that in his day Babylon was very thinly 
inhabited, but wholly by Jews. " Even still," says he, 
" it has a few inhabitants, who are, however, neither As- 
syrians nor Chaldeans, but Jews only." (Theod. Com- 
ment, on Isaiah, c. xiii.) 

As the point to be illustrated is not only the existence 
of Babylon as a Parthian city in Peter's day, but its ex- 
istence as a considerable Jewish colony at that time, the 
following passage from Josephus, relating to an event that 
occurred in Peter's lifetime, is to the purpose : " And 
when Hyrcanus (the high priest, a captive from Judaea) 
was brought into Parthia, the king Phraates treated him 
after a very gentle manner, as having already learned 
of what an illustrious family he was, on which account 
he set him free from his bonds, and gave him a habitation 
at Babylon, where there were Jews in great numbers. 
These Jews honoured Hyrcanus as their high priest and 
king, as did all the Jewish nation that dwelt as far as 
the Euphrates; which respect was very much to his 
satisfaction. But when he was informed that Herod 



EUSEBIUS. 187 

had received the kingdom, new hopes came upon him. 
... Accordingly he talked of that matter with the Jews 
that came often to him with great affection ; but they 
endeavoured to retain him among them, (at Babylon,) 
.... yet did Hyrcanus still desire to depart. Herod also 
wrote to him, and persuaded him to desire of Phraates 
and the Jews that were there that they should not grudge 

him the royal authority And as he wrote thus to 

Hyrcanus, so did he also send Saramallas, his ambas- 
sador, to Phraates, and many presents with him, and 
desired him in the most obliging way, &c. . . . Accord- 
ingly, when Hyrcanus came to Judaea full of assurance, 
by the permission of the king of Parthia, and at the 
expense of the Jews, who supplied him with money, 
Herod received him with all possible respect, &c. . . . 
yet being cautious how he made any illustrious person 
the high priest of God, he sent for an obscure priest out 
of Babylon, whose name was Ananelus, and bestowed 
the high priesthood upon him." (Jos. Ant. xv. 2, &c. 
Whiston's Translation.) 

Josephus also (in his Wars) frequently speaks of Silas 
of Babylon as one of the most distinguished leaders of 
the war party at Babylon in Peter's time, and as having 
taken a very active part among the generals of that city 
in the campaigns which began in Nero's reign, and ter- 
minated in the destruction of Jerusalem. 

The life of Apollonius of Tyana, in Cappadocia, a 
contemporary of Peter's, (who was born about the 
beginning, and died about the end of the first century,) 
affords much illustration respecting the condition of 
Babylon at that time. Flavius Philostratus, in his 
account of this person, tells of his having set off from 
Antioch to Babylon with two attendants about the 
same time as St. Peter went to Babylon ; of his pass- 
ing through a town called Ninus, and into Mesopo- 
tamia, by Zeugma, which had a bridge then across the 
Euphrates ; of his entertainment on the frontiers of 
Babylonia by one of King Vardanes' ten satraps, when 
the guards of the satrap brought the three travellers 
before him ; of his reception subsequently in the palace 



188 EUSEBIUS. 

at Babylon by the king, who happened to be there hunt- 
ing at the time ; of the decorations and paintings of this 
ancient palace; of his journey thence to India; of his 
return to Babylon by ship along the Euphrates from the 
Persian gulf; and of his return from Babylon to Antioch 
by the same route as he had gone. The passages are 
too long for quotation here, but are highly illustrative 
of the place and time in question. (See Berwick's 
translation of Philostratus.) 

But enough has been said to satisfy every sincere and 
conscientious inquirer, that Babylon did exist and flourish 
in Peter's time, and that there is no pretext, therefore, 
(as far as that point is concerned,) for preferring a partial 
Jewish rumour of the fourth century to the plain and na- 
tural language of the Epistles. Accordingly, the learned 
of both churches are now pretty well agreed about it. The 
following quotations and authorities will show, 1, that 
many of the most enlightened of the Roman clergy have 
expressly denied the supposition altogether ; 2, that even 
those of them who have not done so in express terms, 
have abandoned subsequently all the grounds upon which 
they originally professed to adopt it ; and, 3, that as to 
father M c Corry's having, as some Roman Catholics think, 
the support of Protestant writers in thus still preferring 
what was rumoured in the fourth century to what is 
written in the Bible, there never was a more complete 
delusion, inasmuch as scarcely a single modern Protestant 
writer can be found who adopts the on-dit in question ; 
and any who have ever done so, have done it under 
the avowed impression, created by Papal writers, that 
Babylon did not exist as a flourishing city of Parthia, 
with a large Jewish population, in St. Peter's time. 

1. Even the Correspondent in the Times does not feel 
justified in putting forward this perversion of the Holy 
Scriptures. I find so many matters in his statement to 
condemn, that I the more willingly now acknowledge, 
that this is not one of his arguments for supposing that 
Peter left the East. This argument is also abandoned 
by Father Hardouin, Father Caron, (both Jesuits,) and 



EUSEBIUS. 189 

others of the Koman clergy, who, although they con- 
sidered that " Babylon" could not be literally interpreted 
in Peter's Epistles, from the mistaken impression that 
there was no such city in his day, yet acknowledge that 
whatever place it meant, it did not, and could not 
mean Rome, or any other Gentile city. For instance, 
Hardouin supposes that it meant Jerusalem, and Caron 
that it meant Antioch. Father Dupin admits that there 
is not only no reason for supposing it to mean Rome, but 
that there is no room whatever for doubting that it means 
the Parthian Babylon; and this, although he supposes 
that Eusebius and some of the other fathers had under- 
stood it to mean Rome. " The First Epistle," says he, 
" was written from Babylon. Some of the ancients were 
of opinion that Rome was meant by this name, but this 
would not be a natural interpretation, (mais ce sens n'est 

pas naturel) We cannot precisely assign the time 

when it was written ; but we may consider that it was 
written at Babylon, a.d. 45." (Prelim. Diss., sec. 4.) 
And again: "Eusebius says that it is Rome that is 
meant, though, after all, this interpretation is false, and 
it is more natural to say that it was written from Baby- 
lon." (Toutefois ce sens parait faux, et il est plus naturel 
de dire qu'il a ecrit cette lettre de Baby lone. Ibid.) Father 
Calmet mentions several members of his church as hav- 
ing abandoned this interpretation of the carnal-minded 
Jews. " Some (Roman) Catholic writers," says he, 
" for instance, Peter de Marca, John Baptist Mantuan, 
Michael de Ceza, Marsile de Padua, John Aventin, John 
Leland, Charles du Moulin, and perhaps some others, 
have expressed their misgivings as to the truth of this 
interpretation." (Calmet's Comment., Prelimin. Diss, on 
1 Peter.) But it is not misgivings that they express — it 
is unqualified denial, as any one may see by reference to 
their works. For instance : "St. Peter went to Antioch," 
says Peter de Marca, archbishop of Paris, a writer of ex- 
treme celebrity and favour in the Roman church, " and 
from there to Babylon, where the hereditary Patriarch of 
the first Dispersion of the Jews resided. When established 



190 EUSEBIUS. 

in that city, he wrote his first Epistle, as is clear from the 
words, ' The church at Babylon salutes you.' For 
although the ancients (?) supposed Peter to have here 
meant Rome, Scaliger can be shown to be right when he 
says, that this letter was written by the apostle from 
Babylon itself, to those dispersed Jews whose provincial 
synagogues depended upon the Patriarch of Babylon." 
(De Marca de Concordia Sacerdotii et Imperii, lib. vi. 
c. 1.) It is not misgivings, then, that these writers have 
expressed. 

2. Cardinal Baronius betrays how little faith he reposed 
in this on-dit, by having abandoned, on different occasions, 
the different arguments alleged in favour of it. For in- 
stance, on one occasion the cardinal not only acknow- 
ledges that Babylon did exist as a city full of Jews in 
Peter's day, and that it was thought a very likely place 
for Peter to have gone to, but he even suggests that the 
apostle availed himself of these very circumstances to 
practise a pious fraud upon his persecutors. Peter might, 
we are told, have wished to conceal from the Jews where 
he really was, and could not have put them more astray 
than by dating from Babylon, though he lived in Europe. 
" I may here add," says Baronius, " without any disad- 
vantage to our cause, that Peter's reason for not calling 
Rome "Rome," was his not wishing it to be publicly 
known where he went to live after his escape from prison 
at Jerusalem." (Nee me imprudenter dicturum existimo 
si his addiderim, Petrum non esse usum proprio Urbis 
nomine, quod Hierosolymis fug& lapsus e carcere, ubi 
ageret, non ab omnibus percipi vellet. Annals, a.d. 45. 
par. 17.) It is evident, first, that the only chance of the 
success of such a fraud lay in the extreme unlikelihood 
that the apostle should have written Babylon for Rome ; 
secondly, in the well known reality of the Parthian city in 
that day ; and, thirdly, in the great probability that there 
was of Peter's having gone into Parthia. If Baronius be- 
lieved these three things, which his hypothesis implies he 
did, is it too much to say that he must have looked upon 
the on-dit in question as rather improbable, and that he 
was only endeavouring to make out a mere possibility in its 



EUSEB1US. 191 

favour ? And Father Calniet follows him in this singular 
hypothesis, mentioning it as one of the opinions of his 
church. " It is thought," says Calmet, " that he did so 
to prevent its being known where he was when he wrote 
it, for the apostles had a great many enemies every- 
where, and it was but prudent not to expose themselves 
inconsiderately to persecution." (Pour ne pas decouvrir 
le lieu oil il etait. Prelim. Diss, on 1 Peter.) Father 
Ceillier also mentions this hypothesis of Baronius with 
approbation. " The apostle is believed to have written 
in this figurative manner," says Ceillier, " to prevent its 
being known where he was." (Pour ne pas faire con- 
naitre le lieu ou il etait. Ceill. vol. i. art. Pierre. ) Father 
Tillemont says that he found the question attended with 
some difficulty. After speaking of the language in which 
Peter wrote, he says: " There is more difficulty with 
regard to Babylon, from which St. Peter says he wrote 
it." (II y a plus de difficulte sur Babylone d'ou S. 
Pierre dit qu'il l'a ecrite. Eccl. Hist. vol. i.) Finally, 
a large class of Roman-catholic writers enrol themselves 
at once as recognising the improbability of the on-dit in 
question. All the Roman clergy admit that Peter's 
First Epistle was written in the reign of Claudius, for 
they agree in assigning it to a.d. 45. All those of them, 
therefore, (and as I have shown, they are almost all,) 
who consider that the supposed journey to Europe did 
not take place until Nero's reign, are of course com- 
pelled to abandon this on-dit, although many of them 
still continue to express themselves but vaguely as to 
the impossibility of its being true. So far are the 
Roman clergy from agreeing with Father M c Corry in 
his contradiction of one of the plainest passages in 
Scripture. 

3. Nor is he supported in it by any of the Protestant 
writers. Bishop Pearson and Mr. Baratier, to whom 
we are so confidently referred as affording the most 
satisfactory evidence upon Peter's supposed journey into 
Europe, saw no reason whatever for supposing that he 
meant Rome when he wrote Babylon, or that this sup- 
posed journey preceded the Epistle. 



192 EUSEBIUS. 

"We may, indeed, justly regard it," says Dr. Bloom- 
field, "as a mere notion, first originating in error, and 
afterwards caught up by the Romanists, for the purpose 
of supporting their assertion, that Peter was the first 
bishop of Rome. The best founded supposition is, I 
apprehend, that of Erasmus, Calvin, Beza, Lightfoot, 
Scaliger, Salmasius, Le Clerc, Beausobre } Wetstein, 
Bengel, Bishop Conybeare, Benson, Rosenmuller, and 
Adam Clarke, that it means Babylon in Assyria. " 
(Bloomfield on the Gr. Test.) 

" St. Peter," says Matthew Henry, u being at Babylon, 
in Assyria, when he wrote this Epistle, (whither he tra- 
velled as the apostle of the circumcision, to visit that 
church which was the chief of the Dispersion) sends the 
salutation of that church to the other churches to whom 
he wrote. In this salutation he particularly joins Mark, 
the evangelist, who was then with him." (Old and New 
Test.) 

" No satisfactory reason can be assigned for sup- 
posing, as many have done, that Babylon signifies Rome." 
(Thomas Scott on the Old and New Test.) 

" By some," says Dr. Kitto, " an attempt has been 
made to obtain the support of the apostle's own testi- 
mony, in favour of his having at one period resided at 
Rome, by interpreting the words, 4 the church that is at 
Babylon/ as applying to the church at Rome; an at- 
tempt which Dr. Campbell justly stigmatizes as poor, 
not to call it ridiculous." (Kitto's Cyclop, of Biblical 
Literature. ) 

" The word ' Babylon,' without something to give it a 
different application, would," says Barnes, " have been 
understood anywhere to denote the well-known place on 
the Euphrates. Babylon had been an important place ; 
and its history was such, and its relations to the Jews 
such, as to make it probable that the attention of the 
apostles would be turned to it. Nothing would be more 
natural than that they should visit Babylon. There were 
many Jews of the captivity remaining in that region, and 
it would be in the highest degree probable that they 



EUSEBIUS. 193 

would seek to carry the gospel to their own countrymen 

there It should be added here, however, that 

upon the supposition that the word Babylon refers to 
Rome, rests nearly all the evidence which the Roman 
Catholics can adduce that the apostle Peter was ever at 
Rome at all. There is nothing else in the New Testa- 
ment that furnishes the slightest proof that he ever was 
there. The only passage on which Bellarmine relies to 
show that Peter was at Rome is the very passage now 
under consideration." (Barnes on the New Testament.) 

" Among the advocates for the latter sense (the 
figurative), have been men of such learning and abili- 
ties," says Adam Clarke, " that I was misled by their 
authority in the younger part of my life to subscribe to 
it; but at present, as I have more impartially examined 
the question, it appears to me very extraordinary that 
when an apostle dates his epistle from Babylon, it should 
ever occur to any commentator to ascribe to this word a 
mystical meaning, instead of taking it in its literal and 
proper sense. For in the first century the ancient 
Babylon on the Euphrates was still in existence, .... 
but through some mistake it has been supposed that it 
was not. ... It is true that, in comparison of its 
original splendour, it might be called in the first century 
a desolated city ; but it was not wholly a heap of ruins, 

nor wholly destitute of inhabitants Babylon 

was at that time so far from being literally destitute of 
inhabitants, that Strabo draws a parallel between this 
city and Seleucia, saying, at present Babylon is not so 
great as Seleucia, which was then the capital of the 
Parthian empire, and, according to Pliny, contained 
600,000 inhabitants." (Adam Clarke on 1 Peter.) 

Calvin says, in his Commentaries on the Epistles: 
" I see no reason whatever to doubt that Peter was at 
Babylon at that time, for he distinctly tells us that he 
was." Again : " It is a great deal more likely to be true 
that Peter, as his mission required, (ut ferebat apostolatus 
ratio,) travelled in the districts in which there was the 
greatest proportion of Jews ; and we know that there 
were great multitudes of them at Babylon, and in the 

o 



194 EUSEBIUS. 

countries round it." And again : "It also accorded 
with his mission, (ejus vocationi fuit consentaneum, ) 
for we know that he was specially given to the Jews 
as their apostle ; and, for this reason, his travels were 
mainly confined to those countries in which there were 
the greatest numbers of his own nation." And, in 
another place : " For as to the Roman Catholics calling 
themselves 4 Babylonians,' and Rome c Babylon,' merely 
to make it appear that they have Peter's relics, the 
absurdity of this shall be elsewhere exposed." But this 
is enough of such illustration. There are, as I have 
said, no Protestant commentators, with our modern 
knowledge of history, who would choose so far to trifle 
with the sacred text of the inspired writings, as to set 
aside the plain and natural meaning, in order to adopt 
this or any other rumour that might have been afloat in 
the fourth century. 

There are other arguments on this subject which it is 
unnecessary to unfold here. The Greek scholar will 
himself see at once in the wapa of Peter's expression 
TrapETnSrtfjioiQ, that the parties to whom that letter was 
addressed lived in provinces adjoining that in which the 
writer was at the time. The reader of Jewish history 
will remember that Babylon had other claims to the 
care of the great apostle of the circumcision beside our 
Lord's command. The land of Babylon was the native 
land of Abraham. It was there he was married, and 
thence that he emigrated to Canaan. It was to that, his 
father's native country, that Isaac went to seek his wife, 
Rebecca, and from there that Jacob took his wives, Leah 
and Rachel. The country of Babylon was, in short, the 
parent country of the whole Jewish nation, and to which, 
even in its hostility to them, they ever turned with 
affection. The general critic will see that the letter 
written from the capital of the Dispersion, would be 
naturally expected to have on that account the more 
authority, and that Peter's not having mentioned the 
province of Babylon, the capital of the Dispersion, among 
the names of the provinces to which he addressed his 
Epistle, could only be because he wrote it from that 



EUSEBIUS. 195 

province. Such arguments will occur to every one. It 
may, however, be observed, in conclusion, that Baronius, 
and all the Roman clergy, acknowledge that the Chair 
of St. Peter was established in great splendour upon the 
Euphrates in St. Peter's time, that it had its martyrs as 
well as the other churches, and that the bishop of 
Babylon was at the Mcene Council. Of this church on 
the Euphrates, in Mesopotamia, Baronius says : " The 
church of this province was not only one of the earliest 
of all the churches, but also one of the most steadfast 
and most numerous." (Sicut enim antiquissima ita et 
florentissinia erat ejus provincias ecclesia. Annals, a.d. 
311, paragraph 28.) " There was an episcopal chair at 
Babylon," says Father Richard, in the Bibliotheque 
Sacree, " from the very first." (Ily eut un siege epis- 
copal a Babylone des les premiers temps de l'eglise. ) This 
work also mentions four or five of the bishops that sat 
in Peter's Chair at Babylon, of whom the first appears 
to have been that Abdias, to whom one of the absurd 
works got up in the thirteenth century was attributed. 
Another of them, Polychronius, is mentioned by Ba- 
ronius (a.d. 254, paragraph 27), also at considerable 
length in The Acts of the Saints (Acta Sanctorum, 
Feb. 17), as having been crucified before the time of 
the Nicene Council. De Marca, archbishop of Paris, has 
also several important remarks upon the archbishopric 
of Babylon, in his Dissertation, De Primatibus, (vol. iv. 
p. 26), from which, as well as from Baronius, it appears 
to have been one of the most illustrious of Peter's Chairs. 
For the bishops who were present at the Nicene Council, 
the reader is referred to Eusebius (Vit. Const, iii. 7), to 
Theodoret (i. 7), and to Baronius's Annals (a.d. 325, 
paragraph 25 and 26). It ought to be borne in mind, 
that in Peter's time and until the year 229, Babylon 
belonged to the Parthian s, and that it was subsequently 
within the territorial possessions of the king of Persia, 
its bishop being then called a Persian bishop and the 
Jews inhabiting it, Persian Jews. 



o 2 



196 EUSEBIUS. 



IV. 



The next passage to be considered is also at ii. 15, and 
is the tradition about Mark's Gospel over again. After 
saying, in the preceding chapter, that Peter had extended 
his care even to the Gentiles of Rome, who had never 
heard him, by sending them an abstract of his doctrine 
through the church already there, the Cappadocian his- 
torian tells us, that the Jewish disciples of this apostle, 
who had been his hearers in the East, of whom some 
were, as we have seen, Alexandrians, some Romans, but, 
of course, the major part Asiatics, were so delighted with 
his doctrine, as he delivered it vivd voce to them, that they 
also wished for some permanent record of it for them- 
selves ; — that as Mark had travelled with him a good deal, 
they implored this evangelist to commit it to writing ; — 
that this was the origin of the Gospel according to St. 
Mark ; — and that when Peter came to hear of the existence 
of that document, he gave his consent that it should be 
read, not only in the churches of Babylon, Jerusalem, 
and Alexandria, but even at Rome, and in all the other 
churches of the Christian world. Eusebius adds, that 
what he states on this point is also stated by Clemens 
Alexandrinus and Papias, for whose words the reader is 
referred to the sections of this work that bear their 
names. The archbishop of Cappadocia's own words are as 
follows. They occur immediately after the chapter on 

the Kfjovy^ua Utrpov : — 

" Hist. B. II. Ch. XV. 

" On the Gospel according to St Mark. 

" The splendour of Peter's piety so enlightened the 
understanding of all his personal disciples, that they 
were not satisfied with merely hearing him, or with the 
unwritten teaching of his divine Proclamation, but 
earnestly implored Mark, (whose gospel we have,) as he 
was so much Peter's associate, to leave them a record in 
writing of the teaching which they had received by word 



EUSEBIUS. 197 

of mouth, and never desisted until they had prevailed 
upon this person to do so, and thus gave rise to the do- 
cument which is called the Gospel according to St. Mark. 
It is also said, that when the apostle came to know of 
what was done, which he did by divine revelation, he 
was pleased with the enthusiasm of the parties, and 
allowed the document to be read in all the churches, 
( Clemens gives this account in the 6th book of his c Insti- 
tutions,' and Papias,the bishop of Hierapolis, corroborates 
it,) and that this is the Mark whom Peter mentions in 
his First Epistle," &c. 

It is evident that this passage has not one word about 
Mark's Gospel not having been written in Egypt, as 
St. Chrysostom says it was, nor one word about Peter's 
being with him, wherever he was, when he wrote it. 
Nor does Nicephorus, (a.d. 1320,) who wrote in the 
same language as Eusebius, and who was very credulous 
in all such matters, introduce in his paraphrase of this 
passage the slightest allusion to these suppositions, which 
only date, like the rest, from the Reformation. As to the 
first of them, that it was not at Alexandria but at Eome 
that Mark wrote his Gospel, neither Papias, nor Irenaeus, 
nor Clemens Alexandrinus, nor Eusebius, nor Jerome, 
nor Epiphanius, afford the least countenance to this con- 
tradiction of what St. Chrysostom so positively states. 
This has been already shown in the section upon Cle- 
mens Alexandrinus. And as to the second of these 
suppositions, that Peter was with him when he wrote 
his gospel, the four first of these six earliest authorities 
upon the subject attest the exact contrary, and the two 
last say nothing. " Papias," I repeat my own words 
out of that section, " says plainly, that Mark had to write 
from memory ; Irenaeus, that Mark did not write until 
after Peter's death ; Clemens Alexandrinus repeats what 
Papias said, adding, that the existence of Mark's Gospel 
did not come to Peter's knowledge for some time after 
it was written ; Eusebius repeats this addition of Clemens, 
and says, that it was by divine revelation the thing came 
to Peter's knowledge; all which expressions are in- 
consistent with the supposition that Peter was then 






198 EUSEBIUS. 

with. Mark; and neither Jerome, nor Epiphanius, nor 
any subsequent Father, has ever pretended to say he 
was." 

The main source of the modern misconception as to 
what Eusebius writes in the passage we are now con- 
sidering seems to be, that some of the earliest Roman- 
catholic editors have inadvertently made the 15th chapter 
to begin with the last words of the chapter preceding 
it, which relate to the success of the K^vyjaa Herpov at 
Kome, and that this oversight naturally led people to 
suppose that the 15th chapter itself related to something 
in that city, which it does not. On this point I can do 
no more here than invite the reader's attention to the 
arrangement of the text in the additions alluded to. 
Robert Stephens's Paris edition, which was one of the 
first, and carefully taken from the most ancient MSS., is 
free from this mistake. Dr. Burton, in his edition of 
Eusebius, printed at Oxford in 1838, gives the vulgar 
error in his text, but acknowledges in his notes that he 
considers it an error, and that several very early MSS. 
are expressly opposed to it. That Eusebius himself in- 
tended it to stand as Stephens has placed it, is clear from 
the title he gave the 14th chapter, u On theKepvy/mallzTpov 
at Rome ;" the effects of which work there, one naturally 
expects to find in this 14th chapter, and not in the chapter 
about Mark's Gospel; whereas the editors we speak of 
transferred to the following chapter about Mark's Gospel 
the passage of two lines in which these effects are stated, 
making this short chapter of a dozen lines, about Mark's 
Gospel, to begin thus : " And the divine word having in 
this form sojourned among the Romans, the influence of 
the sorcerer was foiled, and perished almost as rapidly 
as the man. The splendour of Peter's piety," &c, an 
incongruity so glaring as to require only to have the 
attention drawn to it. Finally, Sicephorus, in his para- 
phrase of Eusebius, divides the chapters as Stephens does, 
and not one of the MSS. warrants any other division. 
Thus we see, that in the most approved and natural 
division of the chapters, there is no ground for supposing 
that what is related in chapter xv. took place at Rome ; 
that in the chapter itself there is no allusion to that city 



EUSEBIUS. 199 * 

as being the place where the Gospel was written ; and 
none in either of the two passages referred to by Euse- 
bius as his sources of information on the subject; that 
St. Chrysostom assured us it was written in Egypt ; and 
that all the early authorities agree in acknowledging, 
that wherever Mark composed his Gospel, Peter was not 
with him when he did so. To this we may add, that 
even modern writers of the highest standing both for 
learning and piety in the church of Eome, admit, after 
the closest search for evidence of the affirmative, that 
there is no good reason to believe that Mark wrote in 
Italy. " Some persons mentioned by St. Chrysostom were 
of opinion," says Father Calmet, " that Mark wrote in 
Egypt. Others affirm that he wrote after St. Peter's death. 
These different sentiments are enough to prove that the 
circumstances of time and place are uncertain, when and 
where St. Mark composed his Gospel." (Calmet, Diet, 
of the Bible, art. Mark. ) Those who follow the Fathers, 
will here find no uncertainty. 



V. 

The next passage in Eusebius is as follows : " And Linus, 
whom Paul has mentioned in his Second Epistle to 
Timothy, as being with him at Rome, I have already just 
now stated to have been the first elected bishop of the Ro- 
man church after Peter's time ; and Clement also, who was 
appointed the third bishop of that church, is declared by 
Paul to have been his fellow-labourer and fellow-soldier." 
(Euseb. iii. 4.) Although this was not written at Rome, 
but in a part of the East much frequented by Peter, 
and where everything connected with the management 
of the churches would naturally have had its duration 
reckoned from his death, yet from the introduction of 
his name here, it is supposed that Eusebius meant to 
imply that Peter was the first bishop of Rome, and that 
therefore he must have lived in that city. 

One brief and conclusive answer to these suppositions 
is, that Roman-catholic writers themselves, when at all 
acquainted with Greek, frankly and instantly confess 



200 EUSEBIUS. 

that such passages do not imply that the parties from 
whom, or after whom, bishops are reckoned, were them- 
selves bishops. Carminus Fimianus, for instance, already 
cited upon this point, an extremely zealous Roman 
Catholic, the royal Neapolitan professor who edited the 
works of De Marca, archbishop of Paris, says, in his 
preface to the fourth volume, (Naples, 1773,) "When 
Eusebius says that any one was third or sixth bishop of 
Rome after Peter and Paul, or from the apostles, he does 
not mean that these apostles, or that all the apostles, were 
bishops of Rome." And again, on Jerome's saying that 
James was the first bishop of Jerusalem after the 
apostles, the learned Neapolitan at once remarks, — 
" Neither the expression ''from the apostles,' nor the 
other expression, -after the apostles,' implies that the 
apostles were bishops of Jerusalem. In like manner 
when Eusebius says that any one was third bishop of 
Rome," &c, (pp. 14 and 15,) where he adds much more 
to the same effect. 

Another brief and conclusive answer to the above sup- 
positions is, that we have the candid and unequivocal 
confession of Cardinal Bellarmine, as well as of other 
enlightened Roman Catholics, that Peter's being shown 
to have been bishop of Rome, would be no indication 
whatever of his having ever been in that city, "because," 
says the Cardinal, " several other Roman pontiffs never 
were in Rome in their lives." (Bell, de Summ. Pontif. 
lib. ii. c. 1.) 

After two such conclusive answers, it will, perhaps, 
to many appear superfluous that I should adduce the six 
following further illustrations of the present passage; 
but, as I have already remarked, it is important to show 
not only that the statements of the Roman clergy about 
Peter's having left the East are groundless, but that they 
are so utterly — one may even say, so ridiculously ground- 
less, as to render it matter of speculation how it has ever 
been possible for the human intellect to entertain them. 

In the first place the Greek word denoting " after the 
time of," (/uitra,) in this passage, although sometimes used 
to speak of things or persons of the same sort, succeed- 



EUSEBIUS. 201 

ing one another, is nevertheless the most usual expres- 
sion in the Greek language to denote " after the time of," 
even with regard to things or persons of the most different 
kinds. Eusebius himself adopts it in countless instances, 
from which I select the following: " The last siege of the 
Jews after the time of Christ," (iii. 5.) "After Nero 
and Domitian it is reported that there was a partial per- 
secution, in consequence of a popular insurrection in the 
reign of the emperor whose times we are now record- 
ing," (iii. 32.) " Stephen was the first after our Lord 
who was stoned to death by our Lord's own murderers," 
(ii. 1.) "Dionysius, of whom Luke writes in the Acts 
that he was the first who believed after St. Paul's address 
to the Athenians in the Areopagus," (iii. 4.) " James, 
who was the first elected bishop of Jerusalem after the 
ascension of our Saviour," (iii. 5.) Thucydides writes, 
" On the sixtieth day after the battle," (Thucyd. i. 108 ;) 
and Polybius " On the third day after the death of the 
king," (Polyb. xxxvii. 3;) but examples of this are 
almost in every page of every work, for it was the most 
usual way of expressing, " after the time of." 

In the second place, Eusebius, writing from the East 
where the apostles lived, always dates the series of the 
bishops, and other ecclesiastical matters, in the European 
churches as well as in those of Asia, from the apostles, 
or after the apostles, (as has been already shown in the 
section on " The Anonymous Author," in Euseb. v. 28 ;) 
and he does this even respecting those churches in which 
it is known and acknowledged, on all hands, that " the 
apostles" were not bishops, such as Antioch, Jerusalem, 
and Alexandria ; when, therefore, he does this in the case 
of Rome, it cannot fairly be inferred that he thereby 
means to imply that the apostles, or any of them, were 
bishops of that church. He says, for instance, " Theo- 
philus was distinguished in the church at Antioch as the 
sixth bishop from the apostles," (iv. 20,) although no 
writer of any description pretends that there were 
apostles bishops of that church. Even those Roman- 
catholic writers who, contrary to Eusebius and all pre- 
vious historical evidence, suppose that Peter resided 



202 EUSEBIUS. 

seven years at Antioch, as local bishop there, do not 
pretend to say that any other apostle did so beside Peter ; 
or that, dating the episcopal series at Antioch from " the 
apostles," implies that these apostles were bishops of 
that church. Eusebius has also : " Maximinus succeeded 
Theophilus, and was the seventh bishop from the apostles 
of the church at Antioch," (iv. 24.) And again: " Sera- 
pion was the eighth bishop of the church at Antioch 
after the apostles," (v. 22.) In the same way Ignatius, 
in his Twelfth Epistle, addressed to the people of 
Antioch, says : " Remember your holy bishop Evodius, 
to whom first was allotted the helm of your church after 
the apostles." Of Jerusalem, Eusebius writes: " These 
are the bishops of Jerusalem from the apostles until the 
above-mentioned period," (iv. 5,) although there is no 
writer whatever who says that any other of the apostles 
besides St. James was regarded as bishop of that church. 
Eusebius also says, in the same chapter : " For the church 
at Jerusalem consisted solely of converted Jews from the 
apostles to the siege ;" and again : " Narcissus was the 
fifteenth bishop of Jerusalem in succession from the 
siege of the Jews under Adrian, and the thirtieth in 
regular succession from the apostles," (v. 12.) Then, of 
Alexandria, no one alleges that even any single one of 
the apostles was ever bishop of Alexandria, yet Eusebius 
writes thus : " About the twelfth year of the reign of 
Trajan, the bishop of the church of Alexandria, who 
was mentioned by us a little before, departed this life ; 
and Primus was the fourth from the apostles who was 
elected to fulfil the episcopal functions of that city," 
(iv. 1.) Thus also, in the case of Pome, Eusebius says 
that -- Eleutherus was the twelfth bishop of Rome from 
the apostles," (v. Procem,) and that " Telesphorus was the 
seventh bishop of the Roman church from the apostles," 
(iv. 5,) although the Roman-catholic writers consider 
that only one of the apostles was bishop there; and 
although Eusebius and all the ecclesiastical writers, from 
the earliest period, considered that (as was determined 
at the Nicene Council) there could not be more than 
one bishop at the same time in the same city, (Euseb. 



EUSEBIUS. 203 

vi. 43.) In the one passage that we are now considering, 
Eusebius names Peter alone as being the leader and 
representative of all our Lord's apostles, which in 
another place (ii. 14,) he distinctly says that, on account 
of his ability, Peter was. On two or three occasions of 
this sort he names Paul and Peter, instead of the 
apostles generally ; because, although Peter's name suf- 
ficiently represented the rest of the apostles (both those 
of the Jews and those of the Gentiles) in such expres- 
sions, yet as Paul, the Gentile apostle, was more closely 
connected with Eome, the capital of the Gentiles, than 
the Jewish apostles were, his name obtains thus occasion- 
ally a special mention in reference to Rome which it does 
not in reference to any of the Jewish cities. Thus, we read 
in Eusebius : " Clement was the third of the bishops after 
Paul and Peter," (iii. 21,) and " Alexander was the fifth 
bishop of Rome after Peter and Paul," (iv. 1 ;) and that 
such expressions have nothing to do with either a resi- 
dence or a bishopric in Rome is further clearly proved 
by the fact, that we even find the name of St. James, 
whom no Roman Catholic ever supposed to have been at 
Rome or bishop of its church, prefixed to those of Peter 
and Paul in the enumeration of the Roman bishops. 
Thus : " Cerclon lived in the time of Hyginus, who was 
the ninth bishop of Rome after James and Peter and 
Paul," (Epiphanius, Hasres. iv. 1.) Nothing can more 
clearly show how arbitrarily the names of apostles were 
selected on such occasions. " Whoever," says Valesius, 
the Roman-catholic commentator, - ■ would infer from 
this that St. James was bishop of Rome, would only 
make himself ridiculous." (Val. in Euseb. iii. 21.) 

In the third place, Eusebius never in any one case 
dates the episcopal series from the first bishop of the 
series. He always makes use of the apostles generally 
for this purpose, or at least of the apostolic times, which 
he supposes to terminate with the martyrdom of St. 
Peter, whom, as he tells us, (ii. 14,) on account of his 
superior ability, he considered as the leader of the 
twelve, and therefore as their representative. Even when 
he speaks of the episcopal series at Jerusalem, where St. 



204 EUSEBIUS. 

James, one of the apostles, was regarded as first bishop, 
he never on any occasion speaks of the third or fourth 
bishop after James, but always the third or fourth after 
the apostles, and even reckons James as the first of the 
series after them; which may be seen by reference to 
the passages about the church of Jerusalem in the last 
paragraph. In a catalogue of the bishops of this church, 
Eusebius thus expresses himself: " The first then was 
James, called the brother of our Lord ; after whom the 
second was Symeon, the third Justus," &c. (iv. 5.) He 
does not say after whom the first was Symeon, but the 
second was Symeon. According to this method of ex- 
pression, if Peter had been first bishop of Rome, Eusebius 
would have described Linus in the text, as after Peter 
the second bishop, instead of (as he has done) the first, 
and also as the second, instead of the first bishop from 
the apostles, just as he has described Symeon. To the 
attentive reader of Eusebius' s text— to the sincere and 
conscientious inquirer after truth — this argument will, I 
think, wheu duly considered, supersede all others upon 
this point. 

Fourthly. Another consideration, which will prove 
conclusive to the classical Roman Catholic as to the 
import of the passage in question, is that if Linus's being 
said to be the first bishop after Peter, implies Peter's 
being bishop, then Linus's being the first bishop elected 
by lot after Peter, as it is in the text, would mean, not 
that Peter constituted himself bishop of Rome, (which 
is what Roman Catholics think he did do,) but that the 
office was assigned to him by lot, and that he was elected 
to that episcopate by the sortilegium of the Roman Chris- 
tians, a supposition which no Roman Catholic would, I 
think, choose to entertain, but which is involved in the 
interpretation that some have endeavoured to force upon 
this passage. 

Fifthly. Eusebius plainly tells us in the text that he 
is there only repeating in a brief form what he had just 
previously explained more at length; thus referring us 
to his fuller and only previous statement respecting the 
first bishop of the Roman church (book iii., chap, ii.), 



EUSEBIUS. 205 

where we find not one word about Peter's having been 
in that capacity, but only that it was not until after 
Paul and he (the two great apostolic leaders) had closed 
their career, the one in Italy, the other in the East, 
that St. Paul's friend Linus, who had been at Kome 
with him, was elected by lot first bishop of that church. 
The words to which Eusebius in the text refers us 
are: "After the martyrdom of Paul and Peter, Linus 
was elected by lot, first bishop of the see of Rome." 
(Euseb. iii. 2.) When, therefore, we find him in the 
next page professing to recapitulate this statement in 
an abbreviated form, giving Peter's name the preference 
in the second statement, as he had given Paul's the pre- 
ference in the first, it is as unfair as it is contrary to 
common sense, to attribute to the second statement a 
sense which is evidently excluded from the first. 

Sixthly. That Eusebius does not mean to say here or 
anywhere else that Peter was bishop of Rome, is clearly 
proved from numberless places in which he distinctly 
says that Peter never was bishop of Rome. I select the 
following: In the very chapter (iii. 2) to which he 
refers us in the text that we are now considering, we 
have an instance of this. Over that chapter as its title 
he places the words — " Who first presided over the 
church of Rome;" and the whole short chapter is as 
follows : "After this martyrdom of Paul and Peter, Linus 
was first elected by lot to the see of Rome. It is h,e 
whom Paul mentions in his Epistle to Timothy from 
Rome, in the salutation towards the close of the Epistle, 
when he says, c Eubulus, and Pudens, and Linus, and 
Claudia salute you.'" (iii. 2.) Is not this distinctly 
saying that it was not Peter who was so ? — Again, over 
the thirteenth chapter of the same book the title is 
" That Anencletus was second bishop of Rome;" and 
the chapter begins thus : " After Yespasian had reigned 
about ten years, he is succeeded by his son Titus, — in 
the second year of whose reign Linus, bishop of the 
church of Rome, who had held the office about twelve 
years, hands it down to Anencletus." (ii. 13.) Is not 
this, I again ask, — is not this distinctly saying that it 



206 eusebius. 

was not Peter who was first bishop of Rome? And if 
he was not bishop before any one else, is it not true that 
he was never so? Is that man in earnest who gainsays 
this conclusion ? Again, the title of the fifteenth chapter 
is " That Clement was the third bishop of the Roman 
church." The chapter itself is as follows: "In the 
twelfth year of the same reign, after Anencletus had 
been bishop of Rome twelve years, he was succeeded by 
Clement, who, the apostle, in his Epistle to the Philip- 
pians, shows had been his fellow-labourer, in these words : 
" With Clement and the rest of my fellow-labourers, 
whose names are in the Book of Life." Let the reader 
here also pause. Is it not quite certain that the his- 
torian, when he wrote this title and these words, con- 
sidered that Peter had never been bishop of Rome? 
44 That Evarestus was the fourth who presided over the 
church of Rome," is the title of chapter thirty-four of this 
book. The chapter itself is as follows : 44 In the third 
year of the above reign, Clement, bishop of Rome, trans- 
mitting the episcopal charge to Evarestus, departed this 
life, after having superintended the teaching of the 
divine word for nine years with great diligence." The 
question is, was Evarestus the fifth or the fourth of the 
Roman bishops? It is useless to extend these illustra- 
tions, I need only add that Henry de Valois ( Valesius), 
the Roman-catholic commentator upon Eusebius, ac- 
knowledges that neither Irenseus nor Eusebius (our only 
two authorities on that point) ever speak of Peter as a 
bishop anywhere, and that it is a great mistake to sup- 
pose they do. 44 The apostles," says de Valois, 44 had a 
rank peculiar to themselves, nor were they ever reckoned 
among the bishops of the churches." (On Euseb. iii. 14.) 
And again : 44 It must not be forgotten that Eusebius 
never reckons the apostles among the bishops of the 
churches, as I have already remarked .... Irenseus, as 
well as Eusebius, says that Peter and Paul laid the first 
foundations of the church which was in Rome, but these 
writers nowhere reckon them among the bishops of that 
church." (Val. on Euseb. iii. 21.) Thus, in all that 
Eusebius has written — in all the records that we have 



EUSEBIUS. 207 

of the early church up to his time, there is nothing 
more clear than that neither he nor any one else ever 
thought Peter had been bishop of Rome; — a fact which, 
as far as Eusebius is concerned, I have been induced to 
set forth in a clearer light than others have thought 
necessary, because the Correspondent in the Times, and 
a few serious Roman Catholics of modern times appear 
to be so utterly misinformed upon this point as to sup- 
pose that Eusebius says that St. Peter held the See of 
Rome for five-and -twenty years! — and because this his- 
torian himself tells us that he gives us in his history all 
the information that had reached his times respecting 
the apostles, (iii. 31.) 



VI. 

The last passage that we have to examine is that in 
which Eusebius is supposed to say that Philo, the Jew, 
saw Peter at Rome : it occurs book ii. ch. xvii., where this 
eastern historian tells us, that there was another rumour 
in the East, in the fourth century, to the effect that 
Philo, who had been sent into Europe by the Jews of 
Alexandria, on an embassy to Caligula, went there again 
in the reign of Claudius, when he was nearly a hundred 
years old, and that on that occasion he had some corre- 
spondence with Peter, who was still then engaged at 
Jerusalem in the promulgation of the Gospel throughout 
the European cities; an occupation which of course 
ceased as soon as the apostle went to Babylon ; and that 
this rumour about Philo' s correspondence with the 
apostles, vague as it was, derived a sort of credibility 
from the fact, that one of Philo' s works evidently alludes 
to some customs and practices that existed in all the 
Christian churches in the days of Eusebius. The arch- 
bishop of Cappadocia writes thus : " Philo, of whom there 
is a rumour afloat (Xoyoc *x a ) that when he was at 
Rome in the reign of Claudius, he entered into com- 
munications with Peter, who was at that time transmit- 
ting evangelical tidings to the inhabitants of that city; 



208 EUSEBITJS. 

and this is not improbable, for the work I now speak of 
evidently contains allusions to the practices of the church 
that have come down to our days," (ii. 17.) Greek 
scholars will see at once, not only that Eusebius does 
not say that Peter was then at Rome with Philo, but 
that (as we so often find to be the case in these passages) 
he says the exact contrary ; for such readers know that 
o/LuXia does not mean only verbal communication, but 
also such as is carried on between parties in different 
cities, in which way we find it used to express the com- 
munications by letter of Dionysius, bishop of Corinth, 
to the church of Rome, as may be seen in the section on 
this bishop's alleged testimony upon this subject; and 
they also know that ekum unequivocally indicates Peter's 
absence from the place in favour of which he was then and 
thus engaged, a peculiarity connected with words ter- 
minating in the syllable <7£, which may be seen explained 
in any grammar. Jerome, who (as has been already said) 
did not seek to conceal his defective knowledge of Greek, 
understood o/miXia to mean only intimate friendship and 
personal interviews, and so translated it in this passage, 
which seems to have led Baronius, and one or two others, 
into their mistake. But none of the Roman clergy 
now-a-days pretend, either that Philo saw Peter in 
Europe, or even had any communications with him of 
any kind. On this point the Abbe Labouderie, who was 
vicar of Notre Dame in 1815, until Napoleon's return 
from Elba, writes thus in the " Biographie Universelle," 
which (as we have so often said) had some of the most 
learned of the Roman clergy among its contributors: 
" All that story is without foundation, and the critics 
had an easy task to prove that it was false. It is even 
doubtful whether Philo had any knowledge of the 
Messiah. So unreal are those indications of Christian 
truth which some have fancied that they detected in 
his writings," (Biogr. Univ., art. Philon.) And in this 
opinion the Abbe is fully supported by Mangey and 
Pfeiffer, the most exact and learned of all Philo's editors. 
Accordingly, we find that even Fathers Richard and 
Giraud, in the " Bibliotheque Sacree," omit the on-dit 



EUSEBIUS. 209 

altogether. Besides which, it is unnecessary to remind 
the reader, that all those Eoman-catholic writers who 
consider that Peter did not come into Europe, at all 
events, until the reign of Nero, are compelled to admit 
that Philo could not have seen him at Rome in the 
reign of Claudius ; and that, therefore, if there were any 
truth in this other rumour of the fourth century, the 
communication could only have been in writing, and 
must have been carried on between Jerusalem and Rome. 
Among these writers we find (the reader will remember) 
such men as Father Ceillier, Father Baluze, Father Pape- 
broche, Father Pagi, the Abbe de Longuerue, Archbishop 
de Marca, Father Dupin, and a host of other distinguished 
men of that period, as well as almost all who have written 
since their time. In conclusion I may observe, that 
there is not a word about Peter, or this alleged interview, 
in all Philo's voluminous writings ; nor one word, except 
this passage, in any ancient writer about Philo's being in 
Europe in the reign of Claudius; and that every one 
can judge how very slight a rumour that must have been, 
which could derive the smallest accession of probability 
from the mere circumstance mentioned by Eusebius, — a 
circumstance which most people will think quite as likely 
to have occurred if Philo had had no communications 
with Peter as if he had, and which some have been dis- 
posed to think Eusebius placed here for the express 
purpose of showing how devoid of foundation the rumour 
appeared to him to be. " Of a conversation with Peter," 
says Cyprian, in his commentary on Jerome's translation 
of 'O/iuAia, " there is not the slightest trace in Philo's 
works ;" and again, " In all Philo's works there is not one 
word about Christ, or Mark, or anything whatever con- 
nected with the Christian faith But there can be 

no doubt that Eusebius himself considered that the 
rumour he was mentioning was not true." (Ernest 
Salomon Cyprian, in Hieronym. Catal., art. Philo.) 

The main point here to be attended to is, that the 
rumour, as Eusebius reports it, does not say that Philo's 
communications with Peter were verbal; but, on the con- 

p 



210 EUSEBIUS. 

trary, that Peter had not yet relinquished his central po- 
sition at Jerusalem, and his general proclamation of the 
Gospel from that city, when these took place, as is plainly 
expressed by the Greek word employed in the passage. 
According to the Roman clergy, however, there not only 
is no reason to believe that Philo went to Italy in the 
reign of Claudius, as this rumour states, but they ac- 
knowledge that, even if he did, he could not have found 
Peter there ; and that, as far as his writings are concerned, 
there are no grounds in them for supposing that he had 
had any communication with any of the apostles, or that 
he had ever even heard of our Lord. From all which 
we learn how little reliance can be placed, or indeed is 
placed, even by the Roman clergy, upon what Eusebius 
gives us under the name of rumours. It is but fair, 
however, to state, that no modern writer adduces this 
rumour as a reason for thinking that Peter ever left the 
East. Even Father M c Corry does not do so. 



VII. 

Eusebius's Chronicon (a chronological synopsis, written 
before his History, and in Greek, as all his works were) 
is supposed by a few of the less informed of the Roman 
clergy to have stated that Peter went to Rome to be- 
come local bishop of the church there, in the second 
year of Claudius, and that he was for the greater part of 
five-and-twenty years resident at Rome in that capacity. 
I have already shown in Section II. of this Part, that 
the Roman clergy and all the learned in communion 
with that church, have for centuries admitted that Peter 
could not have gone to Rome in the reign of Claudius 
at all ; and that it is their opinion that the writer who 
states he did, is in no case to be depended on. This is 
abundant answer to the supposition in question. But 
that the reader may see the whole of the absurdity of 
supposing that we have the alleged statement upon the 
authority of Eusebius's Chronicon, his attention is in- 
vited to the following facts, all admitted by the Roman 
clergy, as may be seen in the subjoined testimonies : — 



EUSEBIUS. 211 

1. The Greek text of this Chronicon is admitted by 
the Koman clergy to be lost. 

2. Jerome's Latin Chronicon, called by some a 
" Translation" of the foregoing, is admitted, both by 
Jerome himself and by all the Koman clergy, to be so 
only in a very vague sense, and to have been rather an 
abridgment condensed by him from Eusebius and other 
writers. 

3. Jerome's Latin Chronicon is admitted by the 
Roman clergy to be, as it was discovered at the Reforma- 
tion, full of errors and interpolations. Baronius called 
it at that time a " Labyrinth of Error." 

4. Jerome's difficulty in translating from the Greek 
language (in which Eusebius wrote) was, he tells us 
himself, very great ; and Scaliger says that it amounted 
to the most unaccountable ignorance of the simplest 
expressions of the language. 

5. Scaliger collected from two Greek works profess- 
edly compiled in the twelfth or thirteenth century from 
works a few centuries earlier, certain passages which 
appeared to him to represent, more or less exactly, some 
of the lost Greek text of Eusebius. But the Roman 
clergy roundly dissent upon this point from Scaliger. 
They consider that it is very doubtful whether any of 
these passages originated with Eusebius, and perfectly 
certain that a great many of them did not. 

6. One of the Greek works referred to by Scaliger 
is an abridgment of Cedrenus's " Synopsis." The 
Synopsis is now lost. It was originally written by 
Cedrenus, a monk of the eleventh century, who professed 
to have compiled it from various writings extant in his 
time, (one of which was a work on the same subject by 
Syncellus. ) Soon after the death of Cedrenus, it was 
re- written in a form further condensed; and it is this 
second abridgment, which is still extant, to which 
Scaliger had recourse on this occasion. 

7. The other work of the middle ages is a collection 
of extracts from Syncellus's " Compilation of Chrono- 
logy." Syncellus was a monk of the eighth century, 

p 2 



212 EUSEBIUS. 

who also professed to have compiled his work from 
various writings extant in his time; one of which 
Scaliger thinks was the Chronicon of Eusebius; but 
Syncellus scruples not to say that he does not follow 
Eusebius, and frequently acknowledges that their works 
do not agree. As Syncellus's work existed complete in 
the eleventh century, the extracts or abridgment of it 
that Scaliger used, and that we now have, may have pro- 
bably been drawn up about that period. 

8. Even the Greek work thus compiled by Scaliger is 
admitted by the Roman clergy not to contain the alleged 
statement about the second year of Claudius and the 
Five-and- Twenty years. 

The following testimonies will be sufficient : — 
Father Ceillier, after saying that the Chronicon of 
Eusebius consisted of two parts or books, proceeds thus 
(vol. iv. p. 221) : " The Greek text is lost, except some 
fragments scattered here and there, without order or 
connexion, in the writings of Syncellus and Cedrenus. 
Joseph Scaliger is the first who collected these ; and to 
make his work of more importance, he has connected 
these fragments by the aid of a great number of other 
passages derived, not only from these two authors, 
but from the Chronicon of Alexandria, insisting that 
although they are not cited as taken from Eusebius, they 
are nevertheless to be regarded as his. It is from all 
these different passages that the first book of the Chroni- 
con is composed, which he has given us in Greek under 
the name of Eusebius. But no one has been deceived 
about it, and the learned have found several paragraphs 
which could not have been written by Eusebius. .... 
Besides, how could Scaliger be sure that the passages 
which he took from Cedrenus, Syncellus, and the Alex- 
andrian chronicle, were really written by Eusebius? 
.... Scaliger has also given us in Greek the second 
part of this work of Eusebius, in which he assures us 
that he has inserted nothing but what he found in books. 
If this be so, we have through him recovered the Greek 
text of Eusebius which had been so long lost. But he 



EUSEBIUS. 213 

ought to have told us in what books he found these 

things St. Jerome translated into Latin the 

whole of the two books of this Greek Chronicon, but 
took at the same time the liberty of adding whatever he 
thought necessary; so that he made, as we may say, a 
new work of it. (En sorte qu'il en fit pour ainsi dire un 
nouvel ouvrage. ) He inserted several things in it taken 
from Suetonius and various other writers, especially in 
the Koman history, which Eusebius had not much treated 
of, as not being interesting to his own ( Eastern) nation. It 
also seems that he introduced much fresh matter into the 

history of the church All the Latin writers who 

succeeded Jerome made use of his labours; but con- 
fining themselves only to the second part, the first part 
of this Latin work was so much neglected that it no 
longer exists but in a very imperfect state. Even in 
the second there are several errors (beaucoup de fautes) ; 
whether they originated with Eusebius himself, or with 
those who transcribed his MSS., or with his translator 
Jerome, The first had its errors also," &c. 

Dr. Cave in his " Ecclesiastical Writers," says : " The 
Greek text is lost ; and Scaliger, to supply this defici- 
ency, collected what could be found of it in Syncellus, 
Cedrenus, and the Alexandrian Chronicle ; but there is 
good reason to doubt whether these fragments are to be 
considered as having been written by Eusebius." 

In Butler's " Lives of the Saints," (Edition 1838. 
Note, vol. ii. p. 80,) we read " The Chronicle of Euse- 
bius was a work of immense labour Scaliger 

gathered the scattered fragments from Syncellus, Cedre- 
nus, and the Alexandrian Chronicle ; but Scaliger ought 
to have pointed out his sources, and has inserted many 
things which certainly belong not to Eusebius." 

Scaliger, in one of the prefaces to his " Thesaurus 
Temporum," after saying that Syncellus's original work 
was called a " Compilation (s/cAoyr/) of Chronology," 
and that that which we now have is called " Selections 
(iraptK&oXai — excerpta) from Syncellus," then proceeds 
thus : " This MS. was written about 600 years ago. I 



214 EUSEBIUS. 

drew from it all that I was able to detect as likely to 
have been derived from Eusebius ; which is not, how- 
ever, the hundredth part of what Eusebius wrote. But 
just in the same manner as Eusebius used to censure 
Africanus and others who wrote in this department 
before his time, for mis-stating dates and facts, so also 
this Syncellus reprimands Eusebius whenever he con- 
siders him deviating from the truth ; and this to such 
an extent, that whenever he has an opportunity, he 
rarely lets Eusebius off without some severe and even 
abusive language. Cedrenus had, it seems, taken ver- 
batim the whole of Syncellus' s original work, and com- 
piled from it and other such works, a very large volume, 
which he called a ' Synopsis.' But even that did not 
escape the hands of the condensers, — that most certain 
poison of the libraries. Nay, more ; these were guilty 
not only of condensing, but of mutilating the work. 
For what we now have is not a fair abridgment of that 
Synopsis, but rather selections from it without any re- 
gard to dates or the succession of events, and without 
any discrimination as to what was taken, or as to what 
was suppressed. Cedrenus himself was bad enough. 
His writings show him to have been little better than a 
fool ; but those who tore his book to pieces in this cruel 
way are still worse. In short, Cedrenus's work, as we 
now have it, is a mass of sweepings,- — a mere piece of 
patchwork, in which there is both what is false and what 
is true. In this hodge-podge (faragine) I have found 
many things which I consider to be from Eusebius; 
some of which Cedrenus took from Syncellus, and gave 
as if the latter had taken them from Eusebius ; and some 
of which, although not given by Cedrenus as if taken 
from Eusebius, are nevertheless evidently derived from 
him, as we may infer from what we see in Syncellus and 
other writers. The Synopsis of Cedrenus was, I con- 
sider, reduced by the book-butchers to its present con- 
dition not long after the writer's death. But even what 
the condensers had selected, has not come down to us 
quite in the state they left it." 



EUSEBIUS. 215 

Jerome, in his preface to what is called " his Transla- 
tion" of Eusebius's Chronicon, says, after alluding to 
the general difficulties which he experienced in trans- 
lating Greek : "Is there a peculiar propriety in the use 
of some one word, I cannot find one to express it, and 
when I seek to complete the sense by a long circumlo- 
cution, I scarcely hit the meaning of the single word. 
Then come the abrupt transitions — the differences of 
cases in the two languages — the varieties of metaphors 
employed; and, in short, the mode of expression peculiar 
to each tongue. If I attempt a literal translation it 
has a stupid sound. If I am obliged to alter anything 
in the order or the language, I shall be considered to 
have neglected the duty of translator. I must therefore 
beg of you to read as friends, and not as critics, what- 
ever inaccuracies you find, especially as I have dictated 
the work to an amanuensis, and, as you know, with very 
great rapidity." And again: "The fresh matter that 
I have introduced I have taken from other highly 
approved writers. For I wish it to be known, that I 
am to some extent both author and translator in this 
work. I have not only been most careful to give all 
that is in the Greek, but I have also added things of 
myself which it appeared to me that Eusebius had passed 
over, especially about Koman affairs, which he seems, I 
do not say to have been unacquainted with, for he was 
an extremely well-informed writer, but to have only 
slightly alluded to, as being unimportant to the eastern 

nations for whom he wrote From the Trojan 

war, for instance, to the twentieth year of Constantine, 
I have appended and interpolated many things (nunc 
addita nunc mixta sunt plurima), which I took from 
Tranquillus and the rest of the historians of distinction." 
Scaliger confirms one portion of this statement, when he 
indulgently says, in his Prolegomena, prefixed to this 
work of Jerome's : "It seems that when Jerome was 
dictating the translation of Eusebius's Chronicon, his 
attention was divided at the same moment between his 
amanuensis and the writing of other things, so that this 



216 EUSEBIUS. 

distinguished man necessarily made blunders, as any one 
else would have done in such a case, and blunders, 
moreover, which now-a-days would be considered inex- 
cusable in any one with the humblest pretensions to 
classical knowledge, and which would be regarded not 
as accidental mistakes, but as culpable acts of ignorance 
or negligence. Of the infinite instances of this I select 
a few of the more important, and it is truly wonderful 
how such a thing could happen in such an age, when the 
Greek language was more or less used almost every- 
where.' ' And again : " Never did any work come to 
our hands blotted over with so many extensive correc- 
tions, overspread with so many inaccuracies, and so 
marvellously corrupt as are the MSS. of this Latin 
Chronicon of Jerome's." 

Father Tillemont makes the same remarks as Ceillier : 
" St. Jerome translated Eusebius's Chronicon into Latin," 
(says he, art. Eusebius) " or rather, he has converted it 
into a new work." And again : " Every one acknowledges 
that there are a great many errors in what we have now- 
a-days as Eusebius's Chronicon by Jerome, whether 
through the negligence of Eusebius himself, or through 
that of his copyists, to whom Dodwell attributes all the 
discrepancies that we find between this Latin work and 
the history." 

Cardinal Baronius, in his Annals, (a.d. 325, paragraph 
215,) is foremost in acknowledging that the errors and 
corruptions of this Latin work are incalculably great — 
that they occasioned him a greater amount of labour than 
almost any other ecclesiastical record, and that the whole 
work, a " Labyrinth of Error," (Labyrinthus erroris) 
as he calls it, was altered even in form from what it 
originally must have been. 

It is now a century and a half ago since Dr. Cave chal- 
lenged the Roman clergy to produce, even from Scaliger's 
fragmentary and hypothetical copy of the Greek Chro- 
nicon, the alleged statement about the second year of 
Claudius and the Five-and- Twenty years, "no such 
thing," he truly says, " being to be found in this Greek 



EUSEBIUS. 217 

copy of Eusebius," ( Cave, Antiquit. Apost., art. Peter;) 
since which time no one has ever pretended to produce 
Greek words to the effect in question. 

Thus, it has been seen that we neither have the 
original Greek text of Eusebius's Chronicon, nor any 
document by which we can know what was or what was 
not stated in that original Greek text. Another con- 
sideration, however, connected with this point, shows 
that there could have been no such statement in the 
Chronicon, or that even if there had been, Eusebius 
considered it inaccurate. It is admitted on all hands, 
that the Chronicon was written by Eusebius before the 
History — that the History is of the two the more copious 
and more correct record, and that it was subsequently 
drawn from the materials set down by date in the Chroni- 
con. Even if the Chronicon, therefore, had contained the 
statement in question, its not being repeated in the 
History would alone show that it was not to be depended 
on, and either that Eusebius had discovered it to be false 
after having written it in the Chronicon, or that it was 
the mere interpolation of some copyists. On this point 
Father Ceillier, in speaking of the History by Eusebius, 
says : " Eusebius had already written a history of the 
church in his Chronicon, but it was too short in that 

work He therefore undertook the task again, to 

make a more copious and more accurate one (plus ample 
et plus correcte). . . . Eusebius has incorporated in 
one work all those detached statements of the Chronicon, 
and has left us a complete history of all that occurred most 
important in the church (ce qui s'etait passe de plus 
considerable dans l'eglise) during nearly 325 years. . . . 
Socrates, Sozomen, and Theodoret, who wrote the his- 
tory of the church after Eusebius, saw that there was 
nothing more to add to what he had written, and so 
began where he left off." (Vol. iv. p. 256-7.) The later 
and completer work is thus evident. But, as I have said, 
no such Greek passage of the Chronicon exists, nor even 
the slightest reason for supposing that it ever did. 

The Correspondent in the Times and Father M°Corry 



218 EUSEBIUS. 

were not aware, it is to be supposed, of all the facts now 
stated, when they last year cited a passage from Jerome's 
Latin Chronicon, and represented it as a passage from 
either some Greek or Latin Chronicon of Eusebius; and 
there can be no doubt that they will consider it incum- 
bent upon them to take an early opportunity, without 
waiting to be called upon, of publicly undeceiving those 
whom, in this most important particular, they have 
inadvertently so grossly deceived. 

To revert then to the main subject of our inquiry. I 
have said, that as Eusebius lived nine or ten generations 
after the event in question, his merely asserting it, with- 
out having the testimony of any previous writer in 
support of his assertion, would have constituted no 
evidence of it. I have now shown that he not only 
adduces no testimony in support of it, but that he no- 
where asserts it. And I beg the special attention of 
the reader to this point. In Part I. it has been seen that 
none of the writers that now remain to us from the 
centuries preceding Eusebius mention Peter's having 
left the East. In Part II. every passage has been 
analyzed in which the Greek historian is said to have 
asserted that he did; and it has been seen not only that 
there is no such assertion contained in any one of them, 
but that the Roman clergy themselves admit that there 
is not ; which fact, together with the silence of Eusebius 
as to any prior testimony, affords the strongest possible 
corroboration to the whole of Part L It now remains 
to see what allusions subsequent writers have made to 
the isolated conjecture — the unhistorical and untra- 
ditional EC IKE, that the historian of Cappadocia sug- 
gested on the subject. 



PART III. , 
THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 



I. 

The Emperor Julian the Apostate (a.d. 361) is repre- 
sented in the works of St. Cyril, archbishop of Alexandria, 
(a.d. 440,) nearly a century after Julian's time, as having 
said that Peter's monumental urn was in the habit of being 
carried about from city to city by the Christians while St. 
John the Evangelist was alive, and that St. John did not 
begin to write his gospel until he heard of this. This 
statement not only has nothing in it about Rome, but, if 
we may rely upon it, indicates quite a new solution of 
those allusions which we find in Eusebius, and two or three 
other later Fathers, to the supposed existence of Peter's 
relics in that city. " It was, I suppose," says Julian, 
"after receiving information, privately no doubt, but 
still after receiving information, that Paul's and Peter's 
monumental records were being carried about from city 

to City, (to, fxvYifxara Tltrpov /cat TJavXov Trepi^spoineva^ 

that St. John first began to write his gospel." (Cyril 
Alex. adv. Jul. lib. 10, in init.) There is not the least 
imaginable pretext for supposing that this passage could 
have more reference to Rome than + o Constantinople where 
Julian lived, or to Jerusalem, or to any other Christian 
city ; but far from it. It is, as I say, one of the passages 
in the patristic records that might (if attentively con- 
sidered) most effectually undeceive those who imagine 



220 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

that, as Peter's relics were sometimes said to have been 
in Europe, it was therefore evident that Peter himself 
had not been put to death at Babylon. 



II. 

Eutropius, (before a.d. 400,) a Roman historian, says 
of Nero that it was at his instigation, and in consequence 
of the persecution which he had set on foot, that St. Peter 
was put to death at Babylon, as is indicated in Scripture, 
and Paul at Rome, as we learn from other sources. " At 
length," says Eutropius, "to all his other crimes, he added 
this, that he butchered the holy apostles Peter and Paul.' 7 
(Eutrop. Hist. lib. 7.) It is not easy to see upon what 
principle such words as these are supposed to refer to the 
conjecture of Eusebius, that Peter might have been put 
to death in Europe. For though it is true that Nero was 
not then with the army on the Euphrates, yet it is not 
pretended that the Emperor used his own hands in the 
butcheries of this persecution on these occasions, nor 
that his emissaries did not find their way into Babylon 
while it was going on. We learn from the younger 
Pliny and Tertullian, that he caused the Christians 
to be looked for wherever they could be found ; and 
this fact is now fully admitted by the Roman clergy. 
Father Palma, for instance, as has been already men- 
tioned, says, that "this notion (of Nero's persecution 
being confined to Rome) is manifestly false, and utterly 
at variance with the history of those times." And, ac- 
cordingly, Father Dufresnoy admits, (as may be seen in 
the section on Lactantius,) that an expression of the 
kind here used by Eutropius does not indicate where 
either Paul or Peter was put to death, and that we must 
depend for these points upon other sources. 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 221 



III. 



Athanasius (a.d. 373) was not thought, even by Ba- 
ronius, to afford evidence of Peter's having been in 
Europe. Yet in " The Apology for evading his Perse- 
cutors," this distinguished Father is supposed by Bishop 
Pearson, though by him only, to hint at that most impro- 
bable conjecture of Eusebius, about Peter's having 
been put to death in Europe ; but any one can see that 
Athanasius does not make any allusion that could be so 
interpreted. He merely refers to the account given of 
Paul and Peter in the New Testament, (and says he does 
so,) where the one is commissioned to bear witness of the 
Saviour in the Jewish cities of the earth, which all agree 
were not in Europe, (Matt. x. 6, 23, also xxviii. 19; 
John xxi. 15, &c. ; Gal. ii. 7, &c.) and the other at Rome, 
(Acts xxiii. 11.) Athanasius's words are: "Peter, 
although he concealed himself through fear of the Jews, 
(Acts xii.,) and Paul, although he escaped from Da- 
mascus in a basket, (2 Cor. xi. 32 and 33,) yet, when 
they heard such words as l You must bear witness of me 
at Rome,' did not look upon a residence in foreign lands 
as a thing too terrible. On the contrary, when they did 
leave Judaea, it was in the greatest spirits ; and the one- 
hastening to the Jews, (in some MSS. 'to his own 
people,') anticipated his predicted martyrdom among 
them with delight, (2 Peter, i. 14,) while the other, 
when the occasion came, did not recoil from it, but re- 
joiced, saying : ' I am now ready to be offered, and the 
time of my departure is at hand,'" (2 Tim. iv. 6.) 
Surely it cannot be pretended that it is here said that 
Peter ever came into Europe, nor even that he left- 
Jerusalem for the purpose of going there. Is it not 
here said, on the contrary, that he did not? — that he 
went, as directed by his master, to the lost sheep of the 
house of Israel, to some Jewish district, — some city such 
as Babylon, filled with his own people, and with the as- 



222 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

sociations of his ancestors, — in which he himself says, 
that he was about to suffer the kind of crucifixion which 
our Lord had predicted for him at the hands of the 
Jews. We know that Athanasius, notwithstanding 
the construction of his sentence, does not mean to say 
that the very summons above quoted was addressed 
to Peter as well as to Paul. That we know from the 
New Testament, and we cannot suffer anything to con- 
tradict such knowledge. Luke's words (Acts xxiii. 
11) are addressed exclusively to Paul ; but as may be 
seen in the texts above referred to, words of similar 
import about the East were addressed to Peter; to 
the one — u Thou must bear witness of me at Eome ;" 
to the other — " Thou must bear witness of me in the 
cities of Israel, among the lost sheep that have no shep- 
herd." This is the Scripture account. There is here, 
therefore, no allusion to the conjecture of Eusebius, or 
to any other account of Peter than that given in the 
New Testament, as Athanasius himself will be found to 
intimate in those very paragraphs. We cannot wonder, 
therefore, to find that even Baronius does not pretend to 
say that this Father thought the apostle was in Europe. 



VI. 

Philastrius, (a.d. 380,) an obscure bishop, not known 
of what place, in a little tract upon " The Heresies," 
alludes to the story about the Fiery Chariot of the 
Gnostics, of which Arnobius tells us, " It was seen by 
the Romans to have been scattered by the breath of 
Peter;" but he seems to have inferred from this circum- 
stance that Rome itself was the scene of the phenomenon, 
and to have supposed that there were neither Roman 
soldiers nor Romans of any description in any other part 
of the empire except at Rome. It is unnecessary to dis- 
cuss such an extravagant supposition as this, as I know of 
none of the Roman clergy who entertain it. But even 
Philastrius does not say that Peter was personally pre- 
sent. He only mentions his prayers : " When the 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 223 

impostor left Samaria, to escape from Simon Peter, and 
came to Rome, and had there to wrestle in Nero's very 
presence with the apostle, he was overpowered on all 
sides by the apostle's prayers, and was struck by 
an angel, and perished as he deserved to perish." (De 
Hasres. c. xxx.) It will be seen at once that we have 
here (if there be any who still require it) a large acces- 
sion of evidence that the story about the fiery chariot 
was an allegory among the ancients, and not, as some 
think, an ecclesiastical miracle. For he mentions it as 
having occurred in the reign of Nero, as well as upon 
the occasion mentioned by Arnobius, in the reign of 
Claudius; and if (as Father M c Corry and the Corres- 
pondent in the Times pretend) there had really been a 
flaming chariot and four wild horses, with wings of fire, 
passing on this occasion over the highest pinnacles of 
the imperial city, is it to be believed that the most insig- 
nificant writer — even Philastrius — would speak of it in 
such terms as these — as a mere wrestling in the pre- 
sence of Nero? Is it not quite evident that he would 
not? Is it not quite evident that he would advert to 
the very unusual phenomena of a fiery phaeton and flying 
horses, and the wings of these aerial horses supporting all 
that mass, to raise which even for ten minutes into the 
air would have been much more of a miracle than to 
make it fall. Besides, as I have said before, even if it 
had been one of these ecclesiastical miracles, why sup- 
pose that Peter's prayers at Babylon, or at Jerusalem, 
would not have taken effect at Rome? Why suppose 
the necessity of his presence in order to have had the 
advantage of his prayers? Is there not something, to 
say the least of it, most uncalled for in such a supposi- 
tion? But, independently of this consideration, and 
still assuming the reality of the phenomenon in ques- 
tion, Peter's part is — as was shown in the section on Ar- 
nobius — abundantly explained by the doctrines of the 
apostle, disseminated among the Gentiles at Rome in the 
Kepvy/ma Ilerpou, which was published against the Gnostic 
heresy, during the reign of Claudius, and in the Chris- 
tian church — the Chair of Peter — that had been estab- 



224 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

lished there during the lifetime of Tiberius, even before 
this heresy had ever been heard of, and whose prayers 
might very appropriately have been spoken of as " Peter's 
prayers." That the story, however, was considered as 
a mere allegory by Philastrius and the writers of his 
time, is further confirmed by Epiphanius, the cele- 
brated contemporary of this very obscure writer. For 
Epiphanius also wrote a work upon the Heresies, a much 
longer one than that of Philastrius, and he gives in it a 
long narrative about the Gnostic chief at Rome, — a nar- 
rative covering some folio pages, — yet he never once 
alludes to a chariot in the air, nor to Peter's being in 
Europe at the time, nor to its being supposed by any 
one that he was. 



V. 

St. Cyril, archbishop of Jerusalem, (a.d, 386,) is relied 
upon by Father M c Corry, as affording very distinct and 
positive evidence that Peter must have left the East: 
because Cyril, in mentioning the fiery chariot of the 
Gnostics, not only says that it was overthrown by the 
prayers of Peter, as Arnobius and Philastrius had said 
before him, but states positively (which they had not) 
that Peter was present at the time, and on his knees at 
prayer while the fiery chariot was careering in mid air 
above his head. Over and above the fact which seems 
to have escaped Father M c Corry, that Cyril (like the 
one or two other Fathers who mention it) does not make 
Europe the scene of this narrative at all, the narra- 
tive itself proves at once, with overwhelming evidence, 
that the whole story is, as has been already shown, a 
mere allegory ; for the archbishop alters the details in 
three most important particulars, and apparently under 
the impression that he was at full liberty to do so to any 
extent he pleased. He tells us that Paul was present 
on the occasion as well as Peter ; that the impostor was 
a dragon, instead of a man ; and that his aerial chariot 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 225 

was drawn by devils instead of horses. Now, there can 
be no doubt that if these were the facts of an ecclesias- 
tical miracle, and not of a mere allegory, the archbishop 
of Jerusalem would have considered it incumbent on him 
to state his authority for deviating so widely from all 
preceding writers on so remarkable a subject. His state- 
ment, after mentioning the occurrence related in the 
Acts (chap, viii.) and the statue erected at Rome, thus 
proceeds : " But when this heresy first began to spread, 
Peter and Paul, the presidents of the Christian church, 
came forward and showed that this worshipped Sama- 
ritan was a mortal. For he having announced that he 
would rise to heaven, and having been borne aloft in a 
chariot of devils, the apostles upon their knees, and ex- 
hibiting that unity of spirit which renders prayer avail- 
able, shot at the enchanter with the arrow of concord 
through that prayer, and struck him to the earth. This 
was the first dragon of the heresy; but, as soon as one 
head was cut off," &c. &c. I repeat that we have here 
the most conclusive evidence possible that the story is 
an allegory. But even if we had not this, even if it 
were all a literal fact, the archbishop of Jerusalem is 
not (we see) one of the writers who say that it was in 
Europe it took place; a point strangely overlooked by 
Father M c Corry, who would otherwise have seen that 
this statement, in whatever way we view it, does not (as 
he supposes) make it appear that Peter left the East. 



VI, 

St. Ambrose, bishop of Milan, (a.d. 397,) does not say 
anywhere one word about Peter's having been at Rome. 
Baronius and Bellarmine thought he did, and refer us 
to two sermons attributed in their day to Ambrose, one 
on the Nativity of the Apostles, and the other against 
Auxentius ; but all the Roman-catholic writers are now 
agreed, that the bishop of Milan did not write these 
sermons. On this point Fathers Richard and Giraud 

Q 



226 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

say : " Witli regard to the sermons attributed to St. 
Ambrose, there is not, according to the Benedictine 
Fathers, a single one of them that was written by him," 
(Biblioth. Sacr., art Ambrose;) and Father Ceillier 
makes the same remark. But, in addition to this, it is 
to be observed, that in the sermon against Auxentius 
there is not one word at all about Peter's having been at 
Rome. The Benedictine monks themselves, who closely 
examined the text and its MSS., acknowledge that there 
is not ; and have even gone so far as to confess that the 
name of "Rome" had been dishonestly interpolated, so 
as to connect it with the absurd incidents mentioned in 
that sermon ; but that, even if the writer of the sermon, 
whoever he was, had so written, the statement was 
wholly unauthenticated by any previous writer, and 
ought not, therefore, to be believed. The passage in 
question refers to a scene supposed to have taken place 
at the walls of Babylon, on the eve of Peter's crucifixion 
there, and tells us, that although anxious to die, yet 
yielding to the tears of his disciples, he escaped from 
prison, and endeavoured to hide himself. " He was," 
says the writer of the sermon, "just getting outside the 
walls at night, when, seeing his Divine Master appear 
to him at the gate, as if he was going into the city, 
he said, 'Lord, whither goest thou?' The Saviour's 
answer was, 4 1 am coming to my second crucifixion,' 
(venio iterum crucifigi,) which words Peter understood 
to allude to his own death, as predicted by our Lord; 
for Christ could not be crucified a second time." At 
the words, "venio iterum crucifigi," the Benedictine 
monks have written in their Paris edition of Ambrose, 
a.d. 1790: "The old editions have it thus, and all the 
MSS., except very few, in which the word 'Romam' is 
interpolated in a modern hand, (posterior aliqua manus 
1 Romam' addidit ;) and this word has also found its way 
into the text of the Roman edition. As to the appari- 
tion, however, of our Lord to Peter, you will not find it 
mentioned by any ancient writer except Hegesippus the 
Spurious, (lib. iii.,) and Gregory, (in Psal. Pcenit.)" 



THE POSTNICENE RECOKDS. 227 



VII. 

St. Optatus, bishop of Milevis, in Niimidia (at the end 
of the fourth century), merely reiterates what had been 
said upwards of a century before by Cyprian, another 
African bishop, about Peter's Chair being in the Church 
at Rome, as well as in all the other orthodox churches of 
the earth; for the orthodoxy of the Roman church was 
a constant subject of dispute upon the other side of the 
Mediterranean. All the addition that Optatus makes is, 
that in order to enforce the expression, he once or twice 
speaks of it as " the Chair in which Peter sat," instead 
of merely "Peter's Chair;" and some of the Roman 
clergy think (or shall I not rather say, endeavour to 
think) that this marks with more certainty than 
Cyprian's words did, that the apostle must have come 
into Europe; that the "Chair" in question was some- 
thing in Europe, which was not in the East ; and that as 
Peter occupied it he must have been in Europe. But 
this is an argument of which (as may be seen in the 
section upon Cyprian) the Roman clergy have for 
centuries acknowledged the unsoundness and the ab- 
surdity. It will be there seen that the " Chair" in which 
the apostle sat was, as St. Jerome states, a mere figurative 
expression, to denote either the doctrine which Peter 
and the apostles taught, or the authority with which they 
were invested to teach it ; and that, as St. Gregory the 
Great distinctly tells us, Peter filled no capacity in this 
respect with regard to Rome, or, as Father M e Corry 
terms it, " sat in" nothing there, that he did not equally 
u sit in," and equally fill, and moreover at the same time, 
at Alexandria; yet we know that Peter never was at 
Alexandria any more than he was at Rome ; and with 
this authority, or in this " Chair," Baronius admits that 
Peter "sat" in all the churches in the world. (Cum 
negari non possit Petrum sua auctoritate, qua universi 

Q2 



228 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

gregis pastorem agit, omnibus Christiani orbis ecclesiis 
pr^esidere. Annals, a.d. 39, paragraph 20.) This was 
also the doctrine of Cyprian and Optatus, and in general 
of the African and the Koman bishops, as the Koman- 
catholic bishop Aubespine explains in his Commentary 
upon Optatus. They considered that Peter's Chair was in 
every orthodox church in Christendom, and, of course, 
in the church of Alexandria, of Carthage, and of Kome, 
as well as in that at Jerusalem and elsewhere ; in other 
words, that the chairs in all the churches, from the 
Euphrates to the Thames, had been conferred upon Peter 
by our Lord before they had been occupied by their 
respective bishops, and, therefore, that he had " sat in" 
every one of them. They considered, for instance, as 
did Cardinal Baronius and the Eoman-catholic bishop 
Aubespine, that the episcopal chair in England had been 
conferred upon Peter before it had been occupied by any 
of the English bishops; that therefore Peter was the 
first who sat in it, and that the first English bishop was 
his immediate successor. And this is the doctrine to 
which we find St. Gildas alluding, soon after the time of 
Optatus, when he speaks of the chair in England as one 
in which Peter sat. 

The passage from Optatus is addressed to the leader 
of a refractory African sect, that were called the Do- 
natists, and is as follows : — " You cannot deny that you 
know that the chair in which the bishops sit, in the city 
of Rome, was conferred upon Peter before it belonged to 
any one else ; — -that in that chair therefore Peter was the 
first who sat, and that in that chair Linus succeeded him," 
(lib. ii. c. 2 and 3.) The learned Aubespine, who was 
bishop of Orleans, in 1600, and who enjoyed the highest 
reputation in his church, says in his commentary upon 
this passage, that the chair here meant by Optatus was 
" that which our Lord himself occupied, which was given 
by him to Peter, and which Peter imparted to every 
bishop in the world, ay, and still imparts to them." 
(Christi Cathedra — quam Petrus accepit a Christo — 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 229 

quani singulis episcopis cominunicavit Petrus, et singulis 
etiam nunc diebus communicat.) 

Father Dupin also, in his commentary upon the same 
passage of Optatus, explains this African doctrine of 
Peter's being said to have sat in all the chairs of 
Christendom before the various bishops occupied them, 
by observing that the chair in which Peter sat consisted 
of all the different chairs in all the different cities, just 
as we say that the church of Christ consists of all the 
different local churches. (Singula cathedrae inter se 
dici possunt una cathedra, sicut plures ecclesiae sunt una 
ecciesia. In Opt. ii. 2.) 

Such, then, is the chair in which Eulogius sat at 
Alexandria, while St. Gregory the Great was sitting in 
it at Rome, and in which Damasus was sitting at Rome, 
while St. Optatus sat in it at Mile vis, in Numidia — Peter 
having first sat in all these chairs. I do not here stay 
to canvass this doctrine of the African and Roman 
Fathers; but is it, I ask, common sense to say that it 
is a proof that Peter must have left the East ? 



VIII. 

The Old Roman Calendar, (assigned to the beginning 
of the 5th century,) published first by Father Boucher 
(Latine, Bucherius) a.d. 1600, and half a century after- 
wards by Father Henschenius, the Bollandist, states that 
immediately upon our Lord's ascension, and while 
Tiberius was still emperor, Peter took upon himself to 
act at Jerusalem as general bishop of all the Christian 
churches wherever they were planted ; that he acted in 
this capacity with reference to the capital of the empire, 
for twenty -five years, one month, and nine days — (i. £., 
until Paul went there upon his appeal to Nero, and 
Paul's friend Linus was made local bishop of the church 
there ;) that it was not until about ten years after Linus's 
local episcopate began, that Peter was crucified by the 
Jews at Babylon, and that this occurred in Nero's reign 



230 THE POSTNICENE KECOKDS. 

upon the same occasion as St. Paul was put to death at 
Rome. On this statement Father M c Corry and the 
Correspondent in the Times rely as one of the most 
remarkable proofs of Peter's having left the East in the 
reign of Claudius, and of his having been a resident 
local European bishop for five-and-twenty years. 

It has been already shown in Part II., section ii., that 
the Koman clergy have acknowledged for centuries that 
this old hypothesis of Cardinal Baronius, about the 
reign of Claudius and the Five-and- Twenty years, was 
utterly untenable and preposterous. That fact, there- 
fore, is a sufficient answer to the supposition that this 
exploded theory is contained in the foregoing statement, 
if the foregoing statement could possibly have contained it. 
But what such a statement can have to do with proving 
.that Europe was Peter's head-quarters for nve-and- 
twenty years, it is no very easy matter to imagine ; for 
no one pretends or ever has pretended, that the apostle 
appeared in Europe in the reign of Tiberius, upon the 
ascension of our Lord, at which time he is said to have 
had the episcopate of Rome ; and Father Henschenius, 
who was a Jesuit of great learning and celebrity in his 
church, even takes pains to guard the reader against 
supposing that the general episcopate, described in this 
old Roman Calendar, has anything whatever to do with 
the local episcopate of Rome, although Roman consul- 
ships, and the reigns of Roman emperors are employed 
as dates to indicate the duration of it. 

The Calendar in question is entitled " A list of the 
high-priests of Rome," and begins with the three follow- 
ing paragraphs : — 

" Our Lord was put to death in the reign of Tiberius, 
on the 8th of the Calends of April, during the consulship 
of the two Gemini ; and immediately after His ascension, 
the most blessed Peter undertook the episcopate. From 
which time it is here set down in regular succession, 
who was bishop of Rome, how many years each presided 
over that church, and under whose reign each did so. 

" Peter, twenty-five years, one month, nine days. 
His episcopate was in the reigns of Tiberius, Caligula, 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 231 

Claudius, and Nero; from the consulship of Vinicius 
and Longinus (a.d. 30) until that of Nerva and 
Yestinus, (a.d. 65.) He was put to death (on the 
same occasion as Paul) on the 3rd of the Calends of 
July, during this latter consulship, in the reign of Nero. 

" Linus, twelve years, four months, ten days. His 
episcopate was in the time of Nero, from the consulship 
of Saturninus and Scipio (a.d. 56) to that of Capito and 
Rufus," (a.d. 67.) 

The only commentary required here is that of Father 
Henschenius, who remarks on the first of these three 
paragraphs: "As is mentioned in this preamble, St. 
Peter undertook the episcopate after Christ's Ascension ; 

but WITHOUT ITS BEING LIMITED TO ANY GIVEN CITY," 

(sed nulli certo loco adstrictum,) than which nothing 
could be more pointed or explicit ; and that afforded 
by a passage in Eusebius (ii. 22), from which we learn 
that the year in which Linus's local episcopate began 
(i. e. in which Peter's general episcopate ended) at 
Rome, was that in which St. Paul arrived there from the 
East. It is thus translated by Jerome : " In the twenty- 
fifth year after our Lord's Passion, that is, in the second 
year of Nero's reign, Paul is sent bound to Rome." ( Scrip. 
Eccles.,ar£. Paul.) The old Roman Calendar, then, (which, 
with copious notes, is inserted in the Acta Sanctorum, 
in the beginning of the first volume for April,) affords 
not the slightest ground for supposing that Peter left 
the East for a single hour, much less for the episcopate 
of five-and- twenty years. Upon this point it says the 
exact contrary of what Father M c Corry and the Cor- 
respondent in the Times imagine, and was always known 
to have said the exact contrary. For it says that the 
episcopate which Peter held was a general one— was, 
for instance, that of the English and Grecian churches, of 
Antioch and Babylon, of Ephesus, of Alexandria, and of 
Ancona, as well as of Rome ; that it lasted for thirty- 
five years after the Ascension, i.e., as long as he lived, 
but that it terminated in the case of each church upon 
the establishment there of the first local bishop; that 
this occurred, in the case of Rome, on St. Paul's ar- 



232 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

rival there, twenty-five years after the Ascension, and 
ten years before Peter's martyrdom at Babylon; that 
his Roman episcopate therefore was nearly half over 
before the second year of Claudius ; that after the 
second year of Claudius it lasted but fifteen years; 
and that, not being of a local character, the apostle 
was able to fulfil its functions while he was living 
at Jerusalem and Babylon. Thus, I repeat, the old 
Roman Calendar, published by Bucherius, flatly con- 
tradicts Father M c Corry and the Correspondent in the 
Times upon the very point which they brought it 
forward to prove ; and yields not in any other respect 
the shadow of a pretext for supposing that Peter ever 
left the East; but, on the contrary, shows very clearly 
that whoever drew up that document in the fifth 
century had never heard of such a supposition. 



IX. 

Epiphanius, (a.d. 403,) bishop of Constantia, in Cyprus, 
is the earliest writer who applies the term "bishop" to 
St. Peter. Upon the faith of the old Roman Calendar 
he says that this apostle was considered a bishop at 
Rome before Linus; and from this expression Bishop 
Pearson thought it probable that Epiphanius supposed 
Peter had left the East. Bishop Pearson it is true does 
not much press this inference, and none of the Roman- 
catholic writers cite the passage as affording any evi- 
dence respecting Peter's movements. Nevertheless, as 
this is one of the expressions which are liable to mislead 
the general reader, I shall seek to obviate this effect of it 
by suggesting the following reflections : — 

1. According to the old Roman Calendar, which 
existed in his day, and was then the highest authority 
respecting the annals of the Roman church, Epiphanius 
considered that Peter was bishop at Rome during the 
ten or twelve first years after the Ascension, a period 
during which, it is admitted on all hands that Peter was 
in the East. How then does his being considered bishop 
at Rome afterwards show that he must have left the 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 233 

East afterwards, or make it at all probable that Epipha- 
nius thought he did ? But that this writer did not mean 
to imply this in the expression that he uses is further 
evident from the fact (already alluded to) that he wrote 
at considerable length about the Gnostic contest with the 
church at Rome, which occurred in Peter's lifetime, and 
which is the great alleged occasion of the apostle's having 
been bishop of that church, yet does not in that very, 
minute account of Roman matters, give the least hint 
that Peter ever left the East. 

2. Even the being considered as the local bishop of 
any given city does not imply (and never did) the being 
resident there, as the Roman clergy themselves are fore- 
most in admitting, and as all who are conversant with 
ecclesiastical language well know. There are, for instance, 
everybody is aware, several bishops in the Roman church 
— the titular bishops — who never in their lives went near 
the places of which they are said to be bishops. No 
one, for instance would think it a very rational con- 
clusion to infer that the Bishop of Melipotamus ever 
made a single excursion to that Eastern see from the 
mere fact of his being spoken of and considered as 
the bishop there. Is the Correspondent in the Times 
not aware of this? And it is the same with regard 
to Rome and the apostle. Cardinal Bellarmine says, 
honestly, that the being bishop at Rome does not imply 
one's having ever been in one's life in that city. " It is 
evident," says the discerning Cardinal, " that Peter's 
having been at Rome is not essential to his having been 
bishop there; for many who were bishops at Rome, 
never resided at Rome, such as Clement V., John XXII. , 
Benedict XII., Clement VI., and Innocent VI., who 
were ordained in France, and in France lived all their 
lives," (Bellar. de Summo Pontif. lib. ii. c. 1,) — a just 
and ingenuous avowal, which proves this eminent con- 
troversialist to have considered that his church was 
independent of all the evanescent reasons suggested 
by its clergy for supposing that St. Peter made a 
journey into Europe. Father Hardouin, and several 
others of the Roman clergy were, it will be remem- 



334 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

bered, of the same opinion as Cardinal Bellarmine. 
" We need not try to make out that Peter went to Kome," 
says the learned Jesuit, Hardouin, " in order to show that 
the Pope is his successor." (Romam venisse Petrum 
necesse non est, ut sit summus Pontifex Petri successor. 
Quippe qui proprie Episcopus Romanus sive solius urbis 
Romae non sit.) On this principle also all the Roman- 
catholic historians construct their catalogues of the 
Roman bishops. They speak of Peter as succeeding 
Christ, and Linus as succeeding Peter, where there is as 
much reason for inferring that our Lord was at Rome, 
and local bishop there, like Linus, as that Peter was ; and 
these historians always mention in their catalogues, with 
the rest, the five bishops of Rome, who, from a.d. 1 305 
to a.d. 1367, resided constantly in France, at Avignon, 
and were never able to go to Rome at all. All this may 
be seen illustrated in the " Chronologia Reformata," by 
Riccioli, the learned Jesuit of the 17th century. In the 
ninth book of this distinguished work, he gives his 
" Catalogus Pontificum Romanorum," which begins with 
the statement, " Peter succeeded Christ immediately 
after the Ascension." (Petrus successit Christo statim 
ab ascensione.) Then follows Linus, and in due order 
among the rest the five bishops of Rome that never even 
saw that city. Thus even if the apostle has been con- 
sidered as local bishop of Rome, this does not show that 
he had ever left the East. 

3. But the apostle never was considered, and never 
was, a local bishop of Rome. By those Fathers who 
most frequently speak of him as an Italian bishop, he 
was also considered to be at the same time bishop of all 
the Eastern and of the remotest European churches. 
None of them ever speak of him as bishop of the church 
in Italy, in any other sense than as they speak of him as 
bishop of the church in these Islands and of the church 
in Egypt. The reader ought not to allow his attention 
to be diverted from this point, as a good deal of the 
misapprehension he may have laboured under respecting 
such expressions as that of Epiphanius arises from con- 



THE POSTNICENE KECORDS. 235 

founding a general episcopate, such as that attributed 
to St. Peter, with a local one, such as that of Eulogius, at 
Alexandria, or that of Gregory the Great at Rome. The 
whole world, we are told by the Fathers of the fifth century, 
was Peter's diocese. That is the common language of 
that period. St. Jerome, for instance, says that " Peter 
was not bishop of any one city more than of another, but 
bishop of the whole globe." (Non solum unius urbis 
sed totius orbis erant episcopi Petrus et Paulus. Jer. 
adv. Vigilantium. ) St. Augustin says the same thing, 
when he remarks that " Peter received the whole world 
for his diocese." (Totum mundum Petrus accepit. 
August., vol. iv. p. 1161.) Theodoret, in the passage 
where he says that " Paul's Chair" (Spovog) was at Rome, 
yet that Paul was looked upon u as a general founder of 
all the churches, and as a universal teacher of the truth 
in all," says that Peter likewise stood in this general 

relation to ALL the churches. (Koivoi Harepeg Kai §i§a<JKa\oi 

tt]q a\i)Quaq. Theodoret's Epistle to Pope Leo, the 113th 
Epistle. ) The same thing is stated, as has been seen, in 
the old Roman Calendar, and is to be found in various 
other writings after the commencement of the fifth 
century. Thus, then, Peter was at this time considered 
as bishop of the whole world. He was bishop, there- 
fore, of every part of the world, as well as of the whole 
of it. He was called so, and was considered so. But 
this does not prove that he was personally present in 
every part of it — and therefore it does not prove that 
he was personally present in any one given part of 
it (say, England, Egypt, or Italy), however much that 
one given part of it may be found, from the difficulties 
of its position, to surpass other parts in the vehemence 
and reiteration with which it declared him to be its 
bishop. 

The words of Epiphanius occur where he mentions 
the order in which the earlier bishops were considered to 
have succeeded one another in the ancient capital of the 
Empire : "At Rome, Peter and Paul were the first — 
bishops and apostles at the same time — then Linus," &c. 



236 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

And again : " The succession of the bishops at Rome is 
in this order — Peter and Paul, Linus," &c. (Epiph. adv. 
Haeres., lib. i. Hseres. 27.) 



X. 

Prudentius, a Spanish poet (about a.d. 406), is sup- 
posed by Baronius to allude, in one of his Latin poems, 
to the conjecture hazarded by Eusebius, upon the dis- 
covery in the catacombs, during the fourth century, of 
some mixed and broken relics, supposed by Sylvester, 
the then bishop of Rome, to have been those of Peter. 
But it is very doubtful whether the poet ever heard of 
this conjecture, or whether he meant anything more by 
his poetical allusion than that some of Peter's relics were 
thought to be deposited in his Martyrium at Rome, 
although there were none in his Martyrium at Constanti- 
nople. The words of Prudentius may be thus translated : 
" One day saw them both die (i.e. Peter and Paul), but 
with the interval of one whole year. The marsh of the 
Tiber knows the ground dedicated to their two trophies, 
and is a witness thus both of the cross and of the sword ; 
for the two showers of blood that sprinkled these, found 
their way through the herbage of the self-same marsh. 
. . . Yes, the Tiber divides their bones." (Pruden. 
Peristeph. 12.) The poet's somewhat fantastic object 
seems to be to combine a sort of unity with separation, 
which leads him to make two statements that the church 
of Rome denies. One day, says he, saw them die, but 
with the interval of a year ; one spot received their relics 
(or their showers of blood), but with the Tiber flowing 
between the two. The church of Rome considers that 
they died on the same day, and that after death their 
relics were always united. Whether the poet here means 
their martyrdom, or merely the interment of their relics, 
depends upon the sense that we give to the " two showers 
of blood" (bis imber sanguinis), which, applied to Peter, 
is in any sense as far-fetched as anything can well be; 
and will, therefore, quite as appropriately represent his 
relics as it would his bloodless crucifixion. But it is of 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 237 

little importance which sense we give these words. The 
conjecture of Eusebius, in the fourth century, would 
gain no credit from its having been seized upon as a fact 
by a Spanish poet in the fifth. We know that the idlest 
fictions of mythology are mentioned as facts by the 
Greek and Latin poets, and are allowed to be so men- 
tioned, without its being thought by any one necessary 
to contradict or to believe them. I know of no one, 
except Baronius and Bellarmine, who has adduced this 
poet as a competent witness — a witness sufficiently early, 
sufficiently well-informed, and sufficiently exact, to give 
credibility to the conjecture, that Peter was not put to 
death at Babylon, although he himself says that he was 
living there in daily expectation of that event. Yet that 
we must not look for historical accuracy in the poems of 
Prudentius, is proved even by Cardinal Baronius him- 
self, who tells us that we must not implicitly rely upon 
this poet for anything, and least of all for the particulars 
of Peter's crucifixion ; that the poet's notion of the 
period of this event, for instance, is quite wrong (see 
Annals, a.d. 69, paragraph 3), and (to omit numberless 
other instances of inaccuracy or ignorance), that in the 
poem on the martyrdom of St. Hypolitus, Prudentius, 
with a more than ordinary amount of poetic licence, 
unites in one person the stories of three very different 
individuals — a priest, a soldier, and a bishop (see the 
section of this work on Hypolitus). I appeal to any 
conscientious reader in communion with the church of 
Eome, whether he accepts such evidence as this of St. 
Peter's having left the East? and whether he is not 
rather shocked than otherwise, that his church should 
be obliged to have recourse to such a justification of its 
pretensions ? 

The verse of Prudentius, which Bellarmine calls proof, 
is still wider from the mark. It occurs in a hymn upon 
St. Lawrence: — 

" A vaunt, vile Jupiter ! 
Leave Rome her freedom, — leave Christ's people free! 
Paul bids thee hence, the blood of Peter, hence, — 
Yes, Nero's act and thine is now against thee !" 



238 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 



IX. 

Chrysostom (a.d. 407) is cited only by Baronius and 
Father M c Corry. The former says, " that in the homily 
upon the martyrdoms of Peter and Paul," this Father 
says that Peter was residing at Rome, as well as super- 
intending its church. But all the Roman-catholic 
writers, without exception, are now agreed that this 
homily was not written by St. Chrysostom. Bernard de 
Montfaucon, the Benedictine monk, to whose learning 
and care we are indebted for the last and most splendid 
edition of this Father's works, says of this homily : " It 
is the universal opinion of the learned that it is spurious 
and unworthy the pen of Chrysostom ; that the style of 
it, and everything else belonging to it, makes this mani- 
fest — so manifest, in fact, that it is not worth while to 
lose any more time in proving it." " It is unanimously 
agreed," says Ceillier, " that the homily on St. Peter's 
martyrdom is not by St. Chrysostom." (Ceillier on 
Chrysost. vol. ix.) The fact is, there have been so many 
documents discovered to be spurious since the times of 
Cardinal Baronius, that there can be no doubt, if he 
lived now, he would at once acknowledge that the por- 
position he defended is untenable. 

Father M c Corry acknowledges the spuriousness of this 
homily, but says that Chrysostom speaks of Peter's 
Marty ria at Rome, and speaks as if Peter's relics were 
there within them. This is true. But Chrysostom 
speaks also of Peter's Marty ria at Constantinople, and 
speaks also as if the apostle inhabited his tombs there as 
well as those at Rome. This may be seen in the section 
of this work upon Caius. It is, however, of little moment 
in this inquiry, whether Chrysostom is here alluding to 
Peter's relics at all. And if we are to suppose he is, it 
is equally of little moment whether he only alludes to 
the popular notion mentioned by St. Augustine, ( a Men 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 239 

speak as if Peter's relics were at Koine,") or whether he 
thought as Father Hardouin and others, that it was only- 
Peter's head that had been sent there from the East, 
(Petri saltern caput Romam fuisse delatum a Christianis 
ex Hierosolymis omnino credimus ibique religiose illud 
coli. Hardouin,) or whether he supposed, with Eusebius, 
that the complete, though broken skeleton, found in the 
catacombs by Sylvester, in the reign of Constantine, arid 
supposed to have lain there unnoticed and un-identified 
for nearly three centuries, was really that of the apostle. 
Whatever Chrysostom may have thought upon this point, 
he says nothing that could be laid hold of as denoting 
that he, like Eusebius, hesitated about the authenticity 
of Peter's Second Epistle ; or that, like him, he inferred 
from the relics found at Rome, that Peter was not put 
to death at Babylon, where it is indicated in that Epistle 
that his death was about to take place. 



XII. 

St. Jerome, (a.d. 420,) a Latin writer, made some Latin 
translations from the Greek language, which Father 
M c Corry and the Correspondent in the Times regard as 
very tolerable evidence of the old exploded hypothesis of 
Baronius about the reign of Claudius and the Five-and- 
Twenty Years. For, as I have had occasion already to 
observe, these two modern writers do not seem to be 
aware that their church has, for centuries past, been 
compelled to forego this notion altogether, on account 
of its extreme absurdity, and on account of the discovery 
that, notwithstanding the most diligent search, there 
was not the slightest trace of such a notion in any of the 
Fathers, nor even anything that could be brought to prop 
up the hypothesis. 

Nor do these writers seem, with regard to Jerome, to 
be aware of the fact, that in his own works, which are 
very voluminous, there is not one word to make it appear 



240 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

that he thought Peter had at any period abandoned the 
East, and his special mission to the lost sheep of the 
house of Israel. This is quite as extraordinary an inad- 
vertence on the part of these two writers as the former ; 
for they cannot mean to pretend, that although Jerome 
did not assert the thing in his own writings, he should 
be thought to assert whatever was mentioned in the 
works that he translated, or even whatever he supposed 
to have been mentioned in them; and that, in general, 
what is stated, or supposed to be stated, in a translation, 
is to be regarded as the statement of the translator! 
Surely there is no one who will not admit the necessity 
of some distinction here ; no one who will not see at once, 
that if we would examine this question earnestly and 
honestly, we are bound to distinguish what Jerome sets 
down as his own words and his own opinion from what 
he considers that he sets down as the words and opinion 
of another. 

Nor are these their only oversights. They appear to 
have neglected, also, to examine into the circumstances 
connected with the Latin text of the works they quote 
from, either with regard to their accuracy as translations, 
or with regard to the precise import of the words 
employed in the Latin passages they have selected. For 
if they had done so, they would have found that their 
own church teaches (and most properly so too) that 
the accuracy of these works is in no case to be de- 
pended on ; and that, even if it were, yet the expres- 
sions employed did not, in Jerome's day, imply the sense 
that is attributed to them by these two modern writers, 
nor are even now considered by the educated clergy of 
Rome to involve any meaning of this kind. 

As all these points have unaccountably escaped the at- 
tention of these two writers, it is not impossible that others 
also may be deceived about them ; for which reason it is 
important that, in a treatise of this description, they 
should not wholly be passed over. As to the first of 
them, however, viz., that the Roman clergy now reject 
in toto their old hypothesis about the reign of Claudius 



THE POSTNICENE RECOEDS. 241 

and the Five-and- Twenty years, this has been so fully 
shown in Part II. section ii., that it is unnecessary to 
enlarge further upon it here. Yet, as evidence of the extent 
to which these writers have taken information second- 
hand upon this subject, and of the insufficient study 
which they have bestowed upon the authorities they 
have cited, I may here advert to the remarkable fact 
there exhibited, that all the principal authorities in this 
matter mentioned by these writers, flatly contradict them 
upon the hypothesis in question. Take, for instance, 
the four following : — Father Ceillier says, he does not 
consider that Peter left the East until the reign of Nero ; 
i. £., until after he had been to Babylon. Baluze, that 
to suppose him to have left the East earlier, is perfectly 
preposterous. " Quae res quam absurda sit," is the un- 
ceremonious censure which this learned Roman Catholic 
addresses to these two writers. Bishop Pearson said he 
saw no pretext whatever in the Fathers for the hypo- 
thesis ; and Mr. Baratier, that the learned of all creeds 
had long ago determined that the thing was utterly false, 
and utterly at variance with all history, sacred and pro- 
fane ; and these Father M c Corry and the Correspondent 
in the Times refer us to, as four of the ablest authorities 
on this subject ! 

The two points which require a brief illustration here 
are these : 1, That Jerome's original works have nothing 
in them that in the slightest degree warrants the supposi- 
tion that he thought Peter ever left the East, but the 
reverse ; 2, That the passages quoted from his transla- 
tions, only mention Peter as being considered bishop at 
Rome for twenty-five years, and not his having resided 
there for that time, as is alleged by these two mistaken 
writers of last year. 

1. Almost the only illustration that the first point 
admits of, is to be found in the fact that no Roman- 
catholic writer has been able to produce any such passage 
from his original works, the two which they cite being in 
his translations; viz., in the Chronicon, which he says, in 
his preface to it, he condensed from various writings, as 

R 



242 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

well as from the Greek text of a Chronicon by Eusebius ; 
and in his Catalogue of Ecclesiastical Writers, which he 
also says, in a preface, was mainly translated from the 
"Ecclesiastical History" written by this same Greek 
Father. From each of these two works the Roman 
clergy, in the days of Baronius, {i. e., literally, centuries 
ago^) used to quote one passage, which they have since 
withdrawn, on account of the absurdity of the inter- 
pretation which, to make these two passages of use, would 
have been necessary ; and, from all the rest of his works, 
not one single word has at any time been put forward 
by any writer as a reason for supposing this alleged 
journey from the East; which blank, it will be granted, 
could not well have happened if Jerome thought that 
nearly half of the apostle's life had been spent in Italy. 
Another consideration, illustrative of this point, is, that 
Jerome considered Peter to have been put to death 
at Babylon; a fact in Peter's history which is only re- 
cognised by such writers as admit the other fact of 
Peter's never having left the East; no writers, of any 
description or of any period, having imagined that the 
apostle came into Europe in the reign of Claudius, 
unless they likewise imagined that he had been put to 
death there. From this also, therefore, we may see that 
Jerome did not consider that Peter had left the East. 
It is true that he does not expressly name Babylon as 
the place where the apostle was put to death, but we 
know that Jerome did not reject Peter's Second Epistle, 
in which the apostle mentions his crucifixion as immi- 
nent at Babylon ; and we know, also, that he did not 
think the conjecture of Eusebius on the subject worth 
translating in the memoir of Peter, contained in the Cata- 
logue of Ecclesiastical Writers taken out of the History of 
Eusebius ; which omission is the more remarkable, as he 
there mentions Peter's relics, found at Rome by St. Syl- 
vester, and Constantine's Church upon the Vatican Hill 
as one of the repositories in which some of these relics 
were preserved. He says : " Peter has a tomb upon the 
Vatican Hill, near the road of Triumph," (sepultus est 
in Vaticano juxta viam Triumphalem,) and no more; 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 243 

just as in the memoir of Luke, in the same Catalogue, he 
says : u Luke was buried at Constantinople," (sepultus 
est Constantinopoli,) although it is well known that it 
was not at Constantinople that Luke was put to death, 
and that his tomb and Peter's were both built by Con- 
stantine. He plainly says, however, (as is seen in Part I. 
section xiv., and Part II. section iii.,) that Peter lived at 
Babylon ; and in one of his letters to Marcella, he dis- 
tinctly speaks of Peter's martyrdom as not having 
occurred at the same place as Paul's. Jerome there 
says : " Why call Jerusalem accursed on account of our 
Lord's blood having been shed there, while those parts 
of the earth are considered blessed in which Peter and 
Paul, the generals of the. Christian army, poured forth 
their blood?" (Benedicta loca putant in quibus, &c.) As 
Jerome, therefore, did not deny that Peter had been 
put to death at Babylon, we have, from this fact alone, 
almost as clear an indication that he did not imagine 
him to have lived five-and-twenty years in Europe, as 
we have in the other fact of his never having said one 
word in his own writings on the subject. 

2. The two passages from the two translations merely 
say that the apostle continued twenty-five years bishop 
of Rome, (as is mentioned in the old Roman calendar) ; 
that his general proclamation of the gospel at Jeru- 
salem extended to that city, and that about the middle 
of his episcopate, in the second year of Claudius, he was 
specially deputed to that mission by the rest of the 
apostles, to storm the impostor of Samaria, (ad expug- 
nandum Simonem Maguin.) 

The passage from the Catalogue of Ecclesiastical 
Writers is thus : " Simon Peter, after his episcopate of 
the church of Antioch, and after his proclamation to the 
Jewish converts of the Dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, 
Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, passed on (pergit) to 
Rome to the storming of Simon Magus in the second 
year of Claudius, and he also held the sacerdotal Chair 
in that city twenty-five years, until the fourteenth 
year of Nero, by whom he was crowned with mar- 

r2 



244 THE POSTNICENE KECOKDS. 

tyrdom," &c. The reader will here observe one of 
those blunders of Jerome's which naturally resulted from 
the rapidhty with which he dictated, as he himself tells 
us, (velocissime,) to his amanuensis; for a twenty- 
five years' episcopate, which commenced at the ascension 
of our Lord, as Peter's at Rome was said to have done, 
would have terminated at the second year of Nero's 
reign, as is mentioned in the old Roman Calendar, and 
not at the fourteenth, as Jerome seems to say here. The 
passage from the Chronicon, however, is exempt from this 
confusion, though very similarly written : " In the 
second year of Claudius, Peter, as soon as he had 
founded the church of Antioch, is given the mission of 
Eome, (literally, is sent to Rome; — Mittitur, in all the 
MSS.) where he promulgated the gospel, and he was 
also the bishop of that church for twenty-five years, 
without cessation." As Jerome himself says that Peter 
was the bishop of Rome in no other sense than as he 
was the bishop of England, of Alexandria, and of every 
other city in the world, as well as of Alexandria and 
Rome, he clearly did not consider that to have been 
bishop of Rome for twenty-five years, implied the 
having lived there during that time, nor even the having 
been there at all. So that we cannot, with anything 
like fairness, impose such a sense upon his words. 
" Peter was not bishop of any one oitj exclusively," says 
St. Jerome, " but of the whole world." And we learn the 
same thing from the old Roman Calendar, published by 
Bucherius, which had already appeared in Jerome's day, 
and from which he so manifestly drew the twenty -five 
years' episcopate, which he has introduced into these 
two passages of his translations from Eusebius. Such is 
all the evidence that Father M c Corry and the Corre- 
spondent in the Times can find in Jerome, in support of 
the old exploded hypothesis of Baronius about the 
apostle's having lived the greater part of five-and-twenty 
years in Europe. 

The only question that could possibly be raised re- 
specting the expressions employed in these translations, 
is as to whether we are to look upon Jerome's words — 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 245 

" pergit," and " mittitur," in the figurative sense in 
which these and similar words are constantly used in 
the old ecclesiastical historians; (in this passage, for 
instance, of Mcephorus, xiv., 39: Kat yap tt^wtoq o tidv 

AttogtoXljv Kopv(f>aioq Tierpog rrjg VwjLLaiwv KaOrjyrjaaro ttoXswc* 
EiTa Kai eiri rr\v AX^avSpov iroXiv irpujTog /cAr^ow /Litrt&aivev. 
Ei> aig Aivov Kai M.apicov y^sipoTOvriaag, e<j> trepag ttoXeiq 

avzrpzyzv, — thus translated in the Roman editions : Nam 
primus apostolorum ille princeps Petrus Roinange urbis 
gubernavit ecclesiam ; deinde primus etiam Alexandriam 
sorte transit;) or whether we are to look upon these 
words as (what seem to me more probable) the result 
of a misapprehension of this Latin Father's respect- 
ing the import of the Greek preposition etti, with the 
objective case of a city, in Eusebius, ii. 14, where Peter's 
proceedings against the Samaritan are also described in 
metaphorical language, drawn, like that of Jerome's, 
from military affairs. I say that misapprehension is 
here more probable than the figurative sense of these 
wo words, because there can be no doubt as to the 
corresponding passage in Eusebius, and because Jerome's 
extreme inability to translate Greek is well known. This 
inability has been attested by the Roman clergy with re- 
gard to the Chronicon. (Part II. sect, vii.) I shall here 
only add Father Ceillier's remark upon the catalogue : 
" What is certain is, that the history by Eusebius afforded 
Jerome the chief materials for his Catalogue, in which 
he often merely translated the history, with too much 
freedom, however, it must be admitted, and sometimes 
with too little truth." (A la verite avec trop de liberte, 
et quelquefois meme, peu fidellement. Vol. iv. p. 257.) 
But this question about the two Latin words is of very 
little consequence. Father M c Corry and the Correspon- 
dent in the Times do not cite these translated passages 
to show that Jerome understood Eusebius to mean that 
the apostle had left the East for a little time in the reign 
of Claudius, (which would, it is seen, be a great mistake 
on Jerome's part,) but that he understood Eusebius to 
mean that the apostle lived, pretty constantly, five-and- 
twenty years in Europe. And we have seen that the 



246 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

passages do not afford the slightest reason for supposing 
either that Jerome ever said such a thing himself, or that 
he ever represented any one as saying it ; and that, as to 
the supposition itself about these five-and-twenty years' 
residence in Europe, we may well exclaim with the 
learned Roman Catholic Baluze, to whom the Correspon- 
dent in the Times refers us, " Quae res quam absurda I" 

For the passage from Jerome's List of Ecclesiastical 
Writers {art. Mark) cited by Bellarmine, respecting 
1 Peter, v. 13, see Part II. section iii., where it is seen 
that this was merely one of Jerome's many mistransla- 
tions from Eusebius, and that he himself distinctly says 
that Rome was not to be understood by " Babylon." 

For the other passage from the same article, cited 
also by Bellarmine, to make it appear that Mark's 
gospel was written at Rome, and that Peter was there at 
the time, see Parti., in the section on Clemens Alexan- 
drinus, where it will be seen that Jerome alludes to 
nothing of the kind. 



XIII. 

Sulpitius Severus, (a.d. 420 or 429,) a Spanish priest, 
merely makes the same special application to Italy of 
the statement in the old Roman Calendar, as had been 
made before by Epiphanius and Jerome. He says, 
u while Rome had no other bishop yet but Peter," or 
" while Peter was still bishop of Rome," a form of ex- 
pression from which, as has been already fully shown, it 
cannot be inferred that the apostle ever left the East. 
This writer also repeats the allegory about the fiery 
chariot mentioned by Arnobius, imitating Cyril of Jeru- 
salem in the additions which that bishop introduced into 
the story. He says, for instance, that it was by two 
devils that the chariot and four was mainly held up in 
its progress through the air above the heads of the 
astonished multitude, and not only by the eight wings 
of fire of the four wild horses, as in Arnobius' s account 
of it ; and further, that its fall was occasioned not only 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 247 

by the prayers of St. Peter, but by those of St. Paul also. 
He does not say, however, that Europe was represented 
as the scene of this story, nor give us the least reason 
to suppose that, if it was, he considered the apostle's 
prayers could not have had effect there, without the 
apostle's having come himself from Babylon to offer them 
upon the spot. He also gives us the same proof as 
Philastrius does, of his not looking upon it as a real 
event ; for he likewise supposes it to have occurred not 
only at the foundation of the Roman church, as men- 
tioned by Arnobius, but again in the early part of Nero's 
reign, after the arrival of St. Paul in Italy. 

Neither, therefore, in what he says of Peter's universal 
episcopate, still extending to Rome in the early part of 
Nero's reign, nor in what he says of the fiery chariot 
that was supported by the two devils, and dashed to 
pieces by the prayers of the two apostles, Paul's in the 
West and Peter's in East, have we the slightest indica- 
tion of the latter apostle's having come to Europe. His 
words are : " For in Nero's reign the divine religion had 
acquired strength at Rome, Peter acting as the bishop 
there, and Paul having been brought to that city (when he 
appealed to Cassar), which eminent apostle many came 
there to hear, and all these were converted under the in- 
fluence of the truth and of the apostolic miracles which 
were then frequently performed. For it was in those days 
that that celebrated engagement took place of Peter and 
Paul against the impostor of Samaria, who, by magic 
art, to prove himself a god, soared aloft in a fiery equi- 
page, supported by two devils, (duobus suffultus demo- 
niis, ) and when the devils were put to flight through the 
prayers of the apostles, fell down, and was dashed to 
pieces in the sight of all the people." (Sulpit. Lev. Hist, 
ii. 40 and 41.) 

This writer also mentions the general laws of the 
empire which were passed against the Christians in 
Nero's time, and that it was during the persecution thus 
promoted by the Romans in all parts of the world, that 
Peter was crucified by the Jews, as the Scriptures inti- 
mate, in the capital of the Lost Sheep of the House of 



248 THE POSTNICENE RECOKDS. 

Israel, and that Paul was beheaded in the capital of the 
Gentiles. After describing the commencement of this 
persecution as at Rome, he says: "Afterwards even 
laws were passed to prohibit the religion, and proclama- 
tions were issued forbidding any one to be a Christian. 
It was at that period of the persecution that Paul and 
Peter were put to death, of whom one had his head cut 
off, and the other was fastened to the cross." — Ibid. 



XIV. 

St. Augustine, or St. Austen, bishop of Hippo, in 
Africa, (a.d. 430,) says nothing whatever even from 
which we might infer that he thought Peter had ever 
left the East. In one of the places referred to by Baro- 
nius, he states that there was a saying in his day that 
Peter's body was deposited in Rome ; which not only is 
on sign of Peter's having been there when he was alive, 
but shows how doubtful it was whether even his relics 
were deposited there at all. His words are : " Peter's 
body, people say, lies at Rome ; Paul's body lies there ; 
the body of Laurentius lies there ; the bodies of all the 
holy martyrs lie at Rome, and yet Rome is unfortunate ! 
.... Is there all this destruction where monuments 
are erected to the apostles?" (Augus. Sermo in Natali 
Apostolorum.) Would he have introduced the words 
" people say" if he was speaking of a fact well ascer- 
tained? In the other place cited by Baronius, Augus- 
tine says that the Roman church laid claim to having 
the Chair of Peter, quite as much as Jerusalem or any 
other catholic church. But Augustine does not hereby 
mean that Peter had been at Rome. This he shows by 
his illustration ; for in it he says, that the Roman church 
was the Cathedra Christi, although, as has been already 
remarked, our Lord never went to Rome; that the 
Roman church was Peter's Chair in the same way as the 
Synagogue at Jerusalem was Moses' Chair, although 
Moses never was at Jerusalem; and that even Hippo, 
Augustine's own little diocese, was Peter's Chair, without 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 249 

its being even a sign of the Apostle's having been at 
Hippo. The passage is as follows : Petilianus had said 
to this bishop, " If you lay claim to a chair it is that 
which David calls the chair of the scorner, for the 
righteous do not sit in it." Whereupon Augustine re- 
plies : " What has the Chair of the Koman church done 
to you, in which Peter sat and in which Anastatius sits 
to-day ? Or what has the Chair of the Church of Jeru- 
salem done to you, in which James sat and in which 
John sits now, with whom we are associated in Catholic 
unity, (i.e., which is one and the same chair as ours,) 
and from whom you have madly separated in separating 
from us ? Why do you call the apostolic chair the chair 
of the scorner ? If it is on account of the men who, 
you think, speak the law and do it not, did our Lord 
on account of the Pharisees, of whom he says, they say 
and do not, offer any insult to the chair in which they 
were sitting ? Did He not uphold that chair of Moses, 
and condemn them without dishonouring the chair? 
For, He says, they sit in the chair of Moses," &c. ; and, 
again, a page or two afterwards : " And yet not even on 
account of those Pharisees, to whom you unjustly com- 
pare us (who sit in Peter's chair) did our Lord declare 
the chair of Moses vacant, which therefore He meant 
as a type of His own, inasmuch as He says, that it 
was while they were still sitting in the chair of Moses 
that they professed what they did not practise," &c. 
(August, lib. ii. contra literas Petiliani. cap. 51 and 61.) 
This passage not only does not prove Peter to have been 
in Europe, as the Correspondent in the Times supposes, 
but even explains in a very clear and useful manner the 
fallacy of inferring the apostle's residence in a city from 
the mere circumstance of its boasting that it possessed 
his chair ; a fallacy already exposed in the sections upon 
Cyprian and Optatus. 

The passage cited by Pearson is that in which, without 
speaking of Rome at all, Augustine, who lived in Africa, 
says, that the most eminent emperors paid their homage 
at the " Fisherman's tomb." But even if this means his 
monument that was at Rome, his having a monument 



250 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

there does not prove he died there. His brother Andrew 
had one at Constantinople, and even Andrew's body was 
deposited there ; but it is well known that Andrew was 
not put to death at Constantinople. St. Chrysostom, 
however, as has been seen, speaks of the Fisherman's 
tomb that was at Constantinople, and of the homage 
paid to it by the emperors, whom he frequently calls 
" the door-keepers of the Fisherman," because they were 
interred in the vestibule of Peter's martyrium, or mar- 
tyr's tomb, in that city. 



XV. 

Paulinus Nolanus, bishop of Nola, in Campania, (a.d. 
431,) wrote some letters and poems, and in one of the 
latter — the third of the fifteen poems upon the nativity 
of St. Felix — he says that Peter had a monument 
erected to his memory at Rome, as well as that which we 
know of at Constantinople. It is thence inferred by 
Bellarmine that some of the relics must have been con- 
nected with it; and thence again, that the martyrdom 
could not have taken place at Babylon ! Paulinus says : 
" And Rome herself, powerful through her sacred monu- 
ments of the heavenly chiefs, — through Paul and Peter's 
(Paulin. Natal, iii.) To omit the other facts already 
mentioned, I only remind the reader that St. Peter's 
monument at Constantinople had not even a single relic 
connected with it ; and that, although Chrysostom, arch- 
bishop of Constantinople, says that the Christians of 
Antioch gave up Peter's body that it should be deposited 
beneath his monument at Rome, yet St. Augustine, on 
the other hand, admits that it was not in his day an ascer- 
tained fact that it had ever reached its destination, — that 
there was nothing more than a rumour (dicunt homines) 
of its being there. But whoever has leisure to look through 
these poems of Paulinus will receive convincing proof 
that the place of a martyr's death was not considered 
by this bishop to be indicated either by the city in which 
he had a monument, or by the monument which could 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 251 

boast of his remains. For in the eleventh of these 
poems he says, that the bodies of martyrs were like 
physicians to the soul, and therefore placed by Provi- 
dence where they were most wanted ; that it was Provi- 
dence that put it into the head of Ccristantine to bring 
the body of Andrew, St. Peter's brother, from Achaia to 
the new capital, as well as that of Timothy from Asia ; 
and that, although Peter was not fixedly stationed either 
at Babylon or any other city before his martyrdom, yet 
that, after that event, his body was supposed to be 
placed fixedly at Rome, in addition to Paul's, because it 
was most wanted as a physician in the Gentile city. 



XVI. 

Cyril Alexandrinus, archbishop of Alexandria, (a.d. 
444,) wrote a letter to Celestine, bishop of Rome, about 
a folio page and a half long, in which no modern Roman 
Catholic will pretend that he says one word that has the 
least reference either to the conjecture of Eusebius or to 
Jerome's mistranslation. In fact, in the whole letter 
he neither mentions the name of Peter nor alludes to him 
in any way. The only words of this Alexandrian arch- 
bishop that Baronius's imagination could possibly have 
connected with the subject in question, are these : "Things 
absurd and irrational, and which are far removed from 
the apostolical and evangelical faith which the holy 
Fathers have all along preserved and handed down to us 
and to our times." (Cyr., Epist. ad Celest.) It is one of 
thirty-seven letters ascribed to this patriarch, and is in 
some editions placed as the ninth, in others as the 
eighteenth of them. 



XVII. 

Sozomen, an ecclesiastical historian, (a.d. 450,) says 
that the church of Rome was considered to be one of 
the churches that had Peter's Chair in it, as well as the 



252 THE P0STN1CENE RECORDS. 

churches of England and of Antioch, of Babylon and of 
Alexandria. The passage quoted by Baronius is this : 
" Felix, the rival bishop of Borne, survived but a short 
time, and then Liberius was sole bishop — it having been 
thus ordained, it seems, by Divine Providence, so as not 
to disgrace Peter's Chair anywhere by having two bishops 
sitting in it at once ; for this is a sign of discord, and in- 
consistent with the purity of the ecclesiastical law." 
( Sozom., Hist. iv. 14. ) It was hence inferred by Baronius 
that Sozomen must have entertained the conjecture 
hazarded by Eusebius, respecting Peter's not having 
been put to death at Babylon. But there are no grounds 
for this inference respecting Sozomen. In his day all 
the churches recognised the authenticity of Peter's 
Second Epistle (which, in the days of Eusebius, they did 
not), and this document leaves no doubt as to his mar- 
tyrdom having taken place at Babylon; and, besides 
this, the absurdity of inferring that because England, 
Egypt, and Italy were considered to have Peter's Chair, 
the apostle must have gone into those countries, has 
been fully shown in the sections upon Cyprian, Optatus, 
and Augustine. 

XVIII. 

Orosius was a Spanish priest (about a.d. 450), but it is 
not known when he finished his history or when he died. 
" How long he lived," says M oiler, his biographer, " is 
unknown ; but what is most certain is, that he died before 
the end of the fifth century." The Correspondent in 
the Times does not represent Orosius as affording any 
satisfactory evidence of the famous hypothesis of Baronius 
about the second year of Claudius ; but Father M c Corry 
does. Father M c Corry considers that although he says 
nothing about the " Five-and- Twenty Years," yet he 
may be regarded as affording his sanction to Jerome's 
interpretation of the Greek preposition £7n, with the 
accusative case of a city (in Euseb. ii. 14) ; that therefore 
that interpretation must be considered as correct, and 



THE POSTNICENE EECOEDS. 253 

that this writer thence deduced the supposition, not only 
that there had been no church at Home until the second 
year of Claudius — twelve years after the Ascension — but 
also that the apostle then came into Europe before he 
went to Babylon. That Orosius supposed this, in the 
fifth century, cannot be denied. But even the Roman 
clergy do not consider that he was a good judge as to the 
accuracy or inaccuracy of Jerome's translation, nor any 
authority whatever for the fact in question. He writes 
thus : — " In the beginning of Claudius's reign, Peter, the 
apostle of our Lord Jesus Christ, came to Rome, and 
faithfully taught that faith so salutary to believers, and 
proved what he taught by powerful miracles ; and from 
that time there began to be Christians at Rome. Rome 
felt that the following benefit resulted from her faith. 
For when, after Caligula's death, &c. &c. And will any one 
therefore deny that it was in consequence of the apostle 
Peter's coming, and the tender seeds of Christianity 
which had not yet shot forth into profession, that the 
tyranny and civil war which had almost begun, were by 
the Divine Power repressed?" (Oros.vii. 6.) When the 
Roman clergy, therefore, rejected the erroneous translation 
of St. Jerome, it is clear that they also rejected the sanc- 
tion here afforded to it by Orosius, and that they threw 
his authority upon the subject wholly overboard. But we 
cannot be surprised at this, when we reflect that he is 
represented by writers of all persuasions to be an ex- 
tremely bad Greek scholar, constantly mistaking the 
authors in that language, in fact, having little read 
them, and that he was a very inaccurate historian, as 
may be seen by consulting the General Index of Baronius, 
where he has numerous errors, as well as an extreme 
credulity, attached to his name. 

Father Ceillier says : " We find chronological errors 
in this writer, because, as he did not understand Greek 
much, he had not read the Greek authors in their own 
language." (Ceill. vol. xiv. p, 7.) 

Father Dupin says of his History : "It is not ill- 
written, but it is inaccurate. It has many faults, both 



254 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

historical and chronological. He had not read the Greek 
historians, and easily credited whatsoever might help his 
subject, without examining whether it was well attested 
or not." (Dupin, vol. i. p. 368.) 

Charles Weiss, in the " Bibliotheque Universelle," a 
work sanctioned by the Roman clergy, and contributed 
to by many of them, says : u Orosius, little instructed in 
the literature of the Greek language, was utterly with- 
out critical knowledge, and his work ought not to be 
consulted without distrust." (Biblioth. Univer., art. 
Orose.) 

Fathers Eichard and Giraud, in their " Bibliotheque 
Sacree," say : " This History of Orosius is useful but far 
from accurate." (Peu exacte, Biblioth. Sacree, art. 
Orose.) 

Moller, his biographer, remarks : " Even Baronius 
himself, on more than one occasion, calls in question the 
veracity of Orosius, upon the ground of his being ex- 
tremely credulous." 

Casaubon says : " I say nothing of his ignorance of 
Roman affairs, which is sometimes quite astonishing, as 
Baronius himself frequently acknowledges." 

" His ignorance of the Greek language," says Dr. 
Rees, in his Encyclopaedia, " involved him in many 
mistakes." 

Thus we see that Father M c Corry is quite mistaken in 
supposing that the Roman clergy were not warranted in 
rejecting the authority of Orosius as they have done, 
both as a Greek scholar and as an accurate historian; 
and thus we see that, even if they had not, centuries 
ago, acknowledged the error made by Jerome, in his 
translation from Eusebius, and the utter absence that 
there is of the least room or evidence for supposing that 
Peter left the East in the reign of Claudius, yet no 
sincere inquirer after truth could possibly have regarded 
this Spaniard as a competent judge of Jerome's transla- 
tion from the Greek writings of Eusebius. 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 255 



XIX. 



Palladius, bishop of Helenopolis, in Bithynia (a.d. 450), 
is supposed to have written an obscure work about the 
Brahmins, in which the fate of the apostle of Babylon is 
alluded to, as having been brought about during Nero's 
persecution of the Christians in the East, although not 
exactly within his eastern jurisdiction there. Speaking 
of some other things which happened in the East in the 
reign of Nero, the writer has this clause : " In the reign of 
Nero — who imposed the penalty of piety upon Peter and 
Paul, who were, as we know, the leaders of the apostles." 
(Lib. de Bragmanibus. ) This is produced as very fair 
proof that Palladius adopted the conjecture of Eusebius, 
and thought Peter had not been put to death at Babylon, 
but in some part of the Roman empire, and most pro- 
bably in Italy ! It is not known whether this work on 
the Brahmins was really written by Palladius, but the 
evidence of this doubt is not laid before the reader, as 
the words so evidently do not even suggest what they are 
cited to prove. 

XX. 

Petrus Chrysologus, bishop of Ravenna, (a.d. 452,) is 
stated by Baronius to have said, in a sermon " Upon the 
Nativity of the Apostles," that Peter's martyrdom did 
not take place at Babylon, but no such sermon was ever 
by any editor attributed to this bishop. We have only 
176 of his sermons at the most, and this is not published 
as one of them in any edition of his works. No less 
than five sermons on this subject have been, at different 
times, attributed by Roman-catholic editors to different 
writers of this period, and, by Roman- catholic editors, 
again withdrawn from them ; but I do not find that any 
one of the five has ever been attributed in any edition to 
this writer. 



256 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 



XXL 

Theodoret, (a.d. 457,) bishop of a town called Cyrus, 
on the Euphrates, not very far from Babylon, alludes to 
its being supposed in his day, as it had been in St. 
Augustine's, that Peter's relics were in his tomb at Rome ; 
and it is hence inferred, that Theodoret must have 
adopted the conjecture of Eusebius, that the apostle had 
not been put to death at Babylon, but it will be seen that 
he gives grounds for no such inference. His words occur 
in a complimentary and rather inflated address to Leo, 
bishop of Rome, where he says that there came a light to 
the nations from Peter's tomb — that the apostle had 
passed across the meridian of the church like a star, but 
that, unlike other stars, he continues to give light after he 
has gone down, and now from the West as he had before 
from the East. After alluding to Paul's having said that 
the fame of that church had been noised abroad through- 
out all the world, Theodoret thus writes : " But if such 
was the faith of Rome when it first received the seeds of 
Christianity, how shall we speak of the piety which exists 
there now? Moreover, at Rome there are the tombs of 
Peter and Paul, the general founders of all the churches, 
and the universal teachers of the truth in all ; those tombs 
which enlighten the souls of the faithful. The thrice- 
blessed star (or team) of these apostles arosein the eastern 
horizon, shooting forth its rays in all directions, and 
accepted with joy its declination in the western, and even 
from the western horizon now illuminates the world. It 
was they who gave the greatest lustre to your throne. 
This is the climax of all your fortunes. And Providence 
has given fresh lustre to this Chair of Paul's and to this 
Chair of Peter's, by placing your Holiness in it, from whom 
the bright beams of orthodoxy are sent forth." (Theod., 
Epist. ad Leon, 113th Letter.) To the reader whose 
mind is not pre-occupied with the modern hypothesis, it 



THE POSTNICENE KECORDS. 257 

will be evident that Theodoret's metaphor only alludes to 
the transit of the heavenly bodies from the East to the 
West, and not to any journey of Peter's from the East to 
the West; for East and West are relative terms, and 
this bishop, who lived in the East, on the Euphrates, 
could not possibly have meant to say that Peter passed 
in his travels from the east of him to the west of him, as 
we know that Peter did not come from the east of 
Babylon. As the metaphor, therefore, cannot apply in 
this sense to the place where his travels began, so neither 
can we consistently interpret it in this sense of the 
place in which they terminated ; and even if we were 
to do so, the metaphor would not indicate Europe as 
that place ; for Jerusalem, where many of the Roman 
clergy thought the apostle perished, (under an impres- 
sion that Babylon no longer existed,) was quite as truly 
to the west of Theodoret's meridian as Europe was. The 
only evidence, therefore, afforded by this passage is, that 
one of Peter's martyria was at Rome, and that it was 
supposed by Theodoret to enshrine some of his relics. 
We must not, however, forget that St. Augustine admits 
the fact to have been unascertained respecting Peter's 
relics being in Europe, nor that St. Peter had a much 
more splendid martyr's tomb at Constantinople than 
any thing of the kind we hear of his having had at 
Rome, and yet that he had no relics there. 

But even if Peter's head, as Father Hardouin thought, 
or any other portion of his bones, had been sent into 
Europe, Theodoret was not likely to have inferred from 
this that Peter had been put to death there. This is 
proved by the fact, that Theodoret himself admits that 
he sought to collect the remains of martyrs from all parts 
of the East into his own diocese upon the Euphrates. 
u He was not satisfied," says Father Ceillier, u with 
gathering up the relics of the martyrs, and with having 
them carried into his own diocese; he also wrote," &c. 
(Ceill. vol. xiv. p. 36.) Theodoret, therefore, well knew 
that the place where a martyr's body was deposited 
afforded no proof of where the martyr died. 

s 



258 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

Theodoret is also one of the writers who mention the 
downfal of the Gnostic heresy everywhere throughout 
the Koman Empire, through the instrumentality of 
Peter's influence and prayers, either before or very soon 
after this apostle's departure from Judsea to Babylon; 
but he is as far as the rest of the Fathers from saying 
that the flying equipage was seen in Europe. His 
allusion to this phenomenon, like that of Cyril of Jeru- 
salem, and each of the other writers that mention it, 
fully justifies the Eoman clergy when they regard it as an 
allegory, inasmuch as this allusion affords a large supply 
of fresh evidence that it was never regarded otherwise in 
ancient times : for Theodoret not only overlooks Paul's 
presence altogether on the occasion, as unnecessary, but 
(which is still more remarkable) seems to represent that 
the real " contest of miracles" in which the prayers of 
the apostle made the Samaritan fall from a great height 
in the presence of so many Eomans, was what took place 
(as Arnobius tells us) at some town called Brunda, 
because he says that the fall he speaks of occurred sub- 
sequently to the destruction of the eight wings of fire, 
called here "the wings of deception," by which the 
four horses had succeeded in raising the chariot and 
charioteer to an immense height for a considerable 
length of time, above the very highest buildings. Nay, 
Theodoret goes further towards showing that it was an 
allegory; he represents that what he alludes to took 
place after the Samaritan's own times, and after the 
worship of his statue at Rome had begun. Besides 
which (as I have just said), the reader, who is aware 
that the Roman legions were constantly in Samaria and 
the surrounding countries, will see no reason to suppose 
that Theodoret intended to connect Rome at all, or any 
other European city, with the allegory. After expressly 
mentioning Peter's going to attack the Gnostic on two 
occasions in the East, but with so little success that a 
statue was ultimately erected to his memory at Rome, 
this eastern bishop thus writes : " The divine Peter, 
again coming up, stripped him of the wings of decep^ 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 259 

tion ; and then, after challenging him to a contest of 
miracles, and showing the difference between divine 
grace on the one hand and witchcraft on the other, flung 
him down by prayers from a great height, in the presence 
of all the Romans there, thus converting to the faith 
the spectators of this miracle." (Theodor. Fabularum 
Heretic. Epitome, chap, i.) I need not repeat more- 
over that Peter's prayers do not imply Peter's presence. 
It is not to be overlooked in Theodoret's passages, 
that he distinctly speaks of Rome as " Paul's Chair," 
and even as "Paul's Throne," (Spovog). Also that he 
denies any peculiar connexion to have subsisted between 
Peter and Europe, declaring him the " general founder, — 
the general parent of all the churches," (koivoq irarr]^) 
not the peculiar founder of any of them. 



XXII. 

St. Leo the Great, (a.d. 461,) bishop of Rome, is only 
cited by Bellarmine, and by him only to show that this 
Pope had adopted the vague conjecture of Eusebius, that 
as Peter's relics were supposed to be in Europe, his mar- 
tyrdom also may be assumed not to have taken place at 
Babylon. It is far from certain that Leo means to say 
so much ; but I shall not here raise any question as to 
whether the words "ubi exitus glorincatus est" mean 
"where the apostle's martyrdom obtained the most 
glorious results," or simply, "where it took place;" I 
only mention it as a remarkable fact, that even St. Leo 
the Great, late as he flourished, and zealous as he was, 
had nothing more to go upon for Peter's not having died 
at Babylon than this unsatisfactory conjecture, if he 
means even that. His words are : " Besides the rever- 
ence with which this day's festival deserves to be re- 
garded everywhere, it is entitled to a peculiar venera- 
tion in this city, in order that where the death of the 
apostolic leaders has been invested with glory, the com- 

s2 



260 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

memoration of their death should have the greatest joy." 
(Leo Serm. i. de Natal. Apostolorum. ) 

There are other passages in the same sermon which 
would make it appear that Leo, a Latin writer and un- 
aware of the error, wished people to adopt Jerome's 
erroneous translation of Eusebius (Script. Eccl. art 
Peter) about Peter's having left the East in the second 
year of Claudius; but as the Cardinal does not seem 
to consider him authority upon that point, I shall only 
remark, that Leo's exertions were not attended with suc- 
cess, as it is a century and a half from his time that we 
first hear again of this erroneous translation. 



XXIII. 

St. Prosper, (a.d. 463,) a writer of Aquitania, (the 
south-west part of France,) but of whom so little is known 
that we do not know whether he was a layman or a bishop, 
is supposed by Baronius to say, that Peter and Paul were 
witnesses against Nero, as Enoch and Elias were against 
Antichrist, because words to this effect are found in a work 
called "Promises and Predictions," said to have been 
written by St. Prosper; and Baronius thence infers 
that Peter must have been in some European portion of 
the Koman empire! The words are: "Against Nero 
were sent two witnesses, Peter and Paul, the apostles, 
on one hand, and Simon Magus on the other, who de- 
stroyed himself, and deceived Nero ; and against Anti- 
christ two witnesses, the prophets Enoch and Elias," &c. 
(De Promiss. et de Predic.) To say nothing of the 
unreasonableness of Baronius' s inference, it is to be 
observed, that all the modern Roman clergy acknow- 
ledge that this work was not written by St. Prosper, nor 
by any other authority of the church. 

Father Dupin says : " The work on ' Promises and 
Predictions' is not by Prosper, for the author is an 
African, and the style of the work is very different from 

St. Prosper's works But however that be, it 

cannot be St. Prosper's." 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 261 

Father Kichard says: " The unascertained works 
(attributed to St. Prosper) are that on 'Predictions 
and Promises/" &c. &c. 

Father Tillemont says, after alluding to the uncer- 
tainty that exists as to whether this work is to be sup- 
posed written by any one of that name at all or not, 
" what is quite certain is, that it is not written by St. 
Prosper." 

Father Ceillier (vol. xiv.) says: "It seems that Cas- 
siodorus had no doubt as to its being the work of Prosper. 
Notker also attributes it to him, and this was the general 
opinion for many centuries; but, on closer examina- 
tion, it was clear that whoever wrote it was an 
African," &c. 



XXIV. 

St. Maximus Taurinensis, (a.d. 465,) bishop of Turin, 
is supposed by Baronius to have adopted the conjec- 
ture of Eusebius, respecting the rumoured existence at 
Rome of Peter's relics. The reason — the only reason 
that the cardinal assigns for supposing this bishop to 
have joined Eusebius in drawing this unusual inference, 
is because passages to this effect occur in two sermons, 
sometimes attributed to this bishop by the Roman Catho- 
lics since the present controversy respecting Peter began. 
The passages are : " Peter and Paul, although they were 
made by divine dispensation the princes and presidents 
of all the churches, went to deposit their most sacred 
remains in the city which had obtained the dominion of 
all mankind. For our Lord, to show his power, placed 
the princes of his kingdom in the metropolis of the 
world." (First Sermon on the Nativity of the Apostles. ) 
Whoever wrote this passage does not say very clearly 
whether St. Peter ever was at Rome alive. ( See Part III. 
section 15.) The writer of the next passage is more 
explicit: " And where did they suffer martyrdom? In 
the city of Rome." (Fifth Sermon on the Nativity of 
the Apostles.) The sincere and attentive reader will 
s °e at once that we have not the least reason to think 



262 THE POSTNICENE KECORDS. 

that Maximus wrote these sermons, — that great numbers 
of the Roman clergy considered he did not ; and that 
the only reason for now supposing that he did, is 
because there is no other learned saint of the Roman 
church so ancient as Maximus to whom they could so 
well be attributed ; and, to give authority to these pas- 
sages, they must be (according to Bellarmine) attributed 
to " some one who is ancient, a saint, and learned." 
The points to be attended to here, are these : — 

1. That these two sermons, now for the first time 
attributed to this bishop of Turin, were considered by 
all the Roman clergy for several centuries not to have 
been written by him. 

2. That several writers well versed in the literature 
of the Fathers, are mentioned by the Roman-catholic 
writers as affirming in the most positive manner, that 
these sermons could not possibly have been written by 
any one so early as this bishop Maximus. 

3. That Gennadius, a priest of Marseilles (a.d. 492), 
who made a list of this bishop's sermons about thirty 
years after his death, does not specify these two sermons 
among those he mentions. 

4. That the only reasons now discovered for suppos- 
ing them to be the sermons of Maximus, and the only 
causes assigned for their being now published with his 
works, are these three: — 1. That they are so manifestly 
not the composition of Leo, Ambrose, or Augustine, 
that it is easier to suppose them to have been written by 
Maximus than by these Fathers ; which is one of the 
reasons Bellarmine assigns, — but who is there that does 
not see the utter emptiness of such a reason as this? 
2. That some of the Vatican MSS. ascribe them to him 
as well as to Leo, Ambrose, and Augustine ; but every one 
will see that so far is this from being a reason for sup- 
posing them to be his, that it is, on the contrary, a reason 
for not doing so. For if these Vatican MSS. were 
guilty of such egregious inaccuracies as attributing them 
to Leo, Ambrose, and Augustine, why should we think 
them right when they attribute them to Maximus? 
Why may they not — ignorant and careless, as Bellar- 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 263 

mine says they were — why may they not be as egre- 
giously wrong in the one case as in the other? Is it 
not most probable that they were so? 3. That there 
are no means now-a-days of ascertaining exactly when 
or by whom they really were written; and that as 
Maximus is ancient, a saint, and learned, that is suf- 
ficient, — he will answer as well for the reputed author 
of them as any one else. 

The highest Roman-catholic authority upon these 
points is the elaborate edition of the Sermons of Maximus 
Taurinensis, published at Rome by the orders of Pius YL, 
through the College of the Propaganda, in 1784. Of 
the first of the two sermons now under consideration, 
this edition says, — " We do not pretend to deny that 
some of those who wrote the Mediaeval MSS. attributed 
this sermon to St. Leo the Great, as we find done in 
some of the MSS. of the Vatican." 

Philip Labbe, a Jesuit of Bourges, (a.d. 1667,) in his 
Dissertation on Ecclesiastical Writers, as quoted in this 
edition of the works of Maximus, says of this first 
sermon, — " It is published as one of Augustine's upon 
the saints." 

On the other sermon, here attributed to Maximus, 
called in his works No. V., the edition of Pius YL 
says : "It has been attributed to different writers. 
Some of the older MSS. of the Vatican Library assigned 
it to St. Ambrose. Other parties have thought that it 
must be the work of St. Augustine, as is clear from its 
being so inscribed in other MSS. of the Vatican. But 
the Benedictine monks, who have thoroughly examined 
the sermons of Ambrose and Augustine, do not con- 
sider that it is the work of either of them. Some of the 
Vatican MSS. likewise represent it as the production 
of Leo the Great ; but rather more of these mediaeval 
documents give the sermon under the name of St. 
Maximus. Who then will take upon him to say that 
it is not the production of St. Maximus?" 

Of this same sermon (No. V.) Philip Labbe also says, 
after remarking that se'veral learned men, not in com- 
munion with the church of Rome, and some of whose 



264 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

names he mentions, considered it the production of a 
subsequent age: " This and some other sermons are 
to be disowned as forgeries, upon which little or no 
reliance can be placed, — and why so? Is it because 
they are found inserted among the sermons of St. Am- 
brose and St. Augustine, through the unskileulness of 
those who wrote the MSS. in the middle ages, and 
through the ignorance of those who collected what was 
written? Those who talk in this way, know very little 
about examining MSS. How much more rational it 
would be in them to say, with Bellarmine, that although 
they were ascribed to St. Augustine and St. Ambrose, 
this did not much signify ; as both of these writers are 
ancient, canonized, and learned, as well as the person to 
whom they are now attributed?" 

Of both these sermons, Father Tillemont says: 
" Several of the sermons now published under the name 
of Maximus have been attributed to Ambrose and Au- 
gustine, which is, however, no reason for supposing that 
they were not written by St. Maximus. (Ce qui n'empeche 
pas qu'elles appartiennent a St. Maxime.) For people 
are pretty well agreed that they belong neither to Am- 
brose nor Augustine." 

And Cardinal Bellarmine, in his Ecclesiastical Writers, 
remarks : " Whose ever they are, they are the compo- 
sition of an ancient writer and a saint." Again, he 
says : "So that it is clearly impossible to say whether 
we ought to attribute them to Maximus or not." And 
again, u We have said that there were several sermons 
passing at the same time under the names of St. Am- 
brose and St. Maximus; but there is more reason to 
suppose (credibilius est) that they were written by 
Maximus than by Ambrose. There can, however, be 
no very great error in attributing them to either, as 
they are both of them learned, and saints, and fathers." 

It is evident, therefore, that until some better reason 
can be found for supposing Maximus to be the author 
of these two sermons, no sincere inquirer after truth 
will pretend to say that this Father adopted the con- 
jecture of Eusebius. 



THE P0STN1CENE RECORDS. 265 



XXV. 



Elpis of Messina, (about a.d. 520,} the first testimony 
that we have of this sex or of this century, was the wife 
of Boetius, a Roman consul, who died a.d. 526, and is 
thought by Bellarmine (but by him only) to afford the 
required evidence in one of two hymns ascribed to her, 
and still sung in the Roman church. The hymn is 
called " De Apostolis," and the passage refers to the first 
great persecution in Nero's reign, when Rome became 
stained with the blood of martyrs who perished, " not in 
Italy only," as Baronius justly remarks, "but in other 
states and in other provinces." "Oh happy Rome!" 
exclaims this lady — 

" Oh happy Rome ! dyed in the hallowed blood 
j Of many chiefs ! — not by thy light, but theirs 

Dost thou transcend the charms of all the world !" 

Strange testimony this, it must be conceded, of St. 
Peter's not having been put to death at Babylon ! Of 
course Rome and the Roman Government were responsible 
for all the blood that was shed in that persecution. 



XXVI. 

Arator, (a.d. 556,) an Italian poet and sub-deacon 
of the Roman church, is the next and last authority 
adduced by Baronius, who thus admits that he could not 
find what even he could call an allusion to the supposed 
tradition about Peter's having been put to death in 
Europe for a whole century after Theodoret ; and then, 
only in a few almost unintelligible words in the verses of 
this obscure ecclesiastical poet, which were dedicated to 
one of the bishops of Rome, and which even Baronius 
himself is obliged to condemn as an inaccurate (he goes 
so far as to say "heretical") account of Peter's mar- 
tyrdom. This, also, is strange proof of the fact in ques- 



266 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

tion. After shadowing forth that Peter being in the 
"holy body of the church," went about with it from 
shore to shore, — that Paul at Rome, " though supreme 
chief of all the Gentile world, resigned the reins when 
' Peter's Chair' appeared," the poet thus proceeds in the 
words referred to by Bellarmine and Baronius : 

" And it was well worth Paul's and Peter's crown, 
Thus to o'ertop the glory of the Caesars, 
And to proclaim in Nero's tyrant halls, 
The world's great law — ay, and to overcome 
In martyrdom his power; lest, weak and poor, 
As Nero was, the church should give him greatness." 

In these verses there is evidently nothing contrary to 
the Scriptural intimation of Peter's martyrdom having 
taken place at Babylon, nor more than the generally re- 
ceived notion that it was in some way or other during 
Nero's persecution of the Christians that the Jews were 
led, as our Lord predicted they would, to carry this into 
effect, and that it was in consequence of the great moral 
code propounded from "Peter's Chair" at Rome, that 
Nero acted with the more severity in this persecution 
against " Peter's Chair" in the cities of the East. Arator 
does not deny that Peter was put to death at Babylon. 



XXVII. 

Gregory Turonicus, (a.d. 595,) bishop of Tours, is the 
only other writer of the sixth century cited on this sub- 
ject. He repeats that Peter's martyrdom at Babylon was 
brought about by Nero's agency, as well as that of Paul's 
at Rome, whether we are to suppose that it was through 
Vespasian, the general Nero then had in the East, or 
not. This French bishop's words, as quoted by Bellar- 
mine, who alone cites him, are : " Nero gave the orders 
by which Peter was crucified, as well as those by which 
Paul was decapitated," (i. 25,) where we find not the 
slightest reference to Europe as the scene of either 
martyrdom. What evidence, I ask, does this afford of 
this Gregory's having even heard of the conjecture of 
Eusebius? 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 267 



XXV1IL 

St. Gregory the Great, (a.d. 604,) bishop of Rome, 
from whom we might naturally expect to hear all that 
it was possible to allege upon this subject of Peter's 
being supposed to have left the East, does not even 
allude to the superficial inference of Eusebius, that as the 
apostle had trophies or martyria at Rome, it may be 
supposed that he was transferred there from Babylon to 
be put to death. This Father merely contradicts the old 
Roman Calendar as to the duration of Peter's general 
episcopate with regard to Rome, by saying that it did 
not terminate at Rome until his death at Babylon, 
(although it terminated sooner both at Alexandria and 
Antioch, ) for this Calendar had said that when Peter 
died at Babylon, he was not bishop of Rome, (or, in the 
Chair of Rome,) but that his general episcopate termi- 
nated, with regard to Rome, ten years before his death 
and twenty-five years after the Ascension. The passage 
cited from Gregory is that celebrated one in a letter to 
the archbishop of Alexandria, in which the bishop of 
Rome acknowledges how unorthodox it was to deny that 
Alexandria was Peter's Chair quite as much as Rome 
ever was, and therefore acknowledges also, that Rome's 
being called " Peter's Chair," or Peter's being said to 
have lived or died in this Chair, had nothing whatever 
to do with the supposition of Eusebius. His words 
occur where he speaks of Alexandria, Antioch, and 
Rome as three of Peter's Chairs : " Although, therefore, 
there were many apostles, yet as far as the supremacy 
was concerned, Peter's Chair alone had it; which in 
these three cities is still only the Chair of one apostle ; 
for by his own act he dignified his chair when in it he 
condescended to remain always and to die ; by his own 
act he adorned his Chair when to it he sent his disciple 
the Evangelist ; and by his own act he consolidated his 
Chair when he sat in it seven years, although he did not 
mean to occupy it always. As, therefore, this See (or 



268 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

Chair) of Peter, belongs to one apostle, and is one, 
although by divine authority the three bishops of these 
cities now sit in it, whatever merits I hear ascribed to 
you I attribute to myself, and if you can credit any- 
thing good you hear of me, set this down to your own 
deserts, for we are one," &c. (Greg. Letters, book vi. 
No. 40, to Eulogius, archbishop of Alexandria.) On 
which passage the Benedictine Fathers, in their edition, 
say that Peter's Chair at Rome £pr his Roman See) was 
one and the same thing as Peter's Chair (or See) at 
Alexandria, and as Peter's Chair (or See) at Antioch 
(unius sedem esse atque unam.) The utmost then that 
we gather from the words of St. Gregory the Great is, 
that he was one of those who considered that of the 
Roman church Peter never gave up his presidency till 
his death at Babylon, (i. e. during thirty-five years,) 
and that Rome was the only one of the three churches 
now in question of which this could be said. Of these 
opinions the first, as has been said, is contradicted by 
the old Roman Calendar, a century before Gregory's 
time, and the second by the writers of the Greek church, 
who all considered that the apostle retained the pre- 
sidency or chair, or see of every local church, and 
of Antioch among the rest, until his martyrdom at 

Babylon, (o $£ avroq /uiera ty]Q ev Avrioyzia EKK\r}<naQ Kai 

TY]Q £V V(jt)jU7f 7Tp(s)TOQ 7rpO£<JTY) ZU)Q TTJQ TeXutOGEtog CIVTOV. 

Syncellus apud Scaligeri Thesaur. Temporum.) But 
(without discussing these opinions) we see that Gre- 
gory's words do not imply his concurrence in the con- 
jecture of Eusebius; Peter's chair anywhere implying 
only (as all the Fathers who use that expression are 
agreed) his being considered bishop there ; and his dying 
in it, therefore, his dying bishop of that place wherever 
it might be, — although his death took place at Babylon. 



XXIX. 

St. Isidore, (a.d. 636,) bishop of Seville, the last of the 
alleged testimonies on this subject, has written a work, 
called " Illustrious Writers," in imitation of St. Jerome, 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 269 

and in his memoir of Peter in this work, he mentions as 
a fact the supposition of Eusebius, that as some of 
Peter's relics were in his Roman martyria, Peter is not 
to be supposed to have been put to death at Babylon, 
where he lived when he was writing his Epistles, but 
to have been transferred for that purpose to Italy, as 
Ignatius was from Antioch. The only passage quoted 
by Cardinal Bellarmine, who alone cites this Father, is 
as follows: "In the 37th year after our Lord's death, 
Peter was crucified by Nero at Rome, in an inversed 
position, as he himself desired." Granting the accuracy 
of Isidore's MSS. with regard to the words " at Rome" 
I do not think that any sincere and conscientious in- 
quirer will for a moment regard Isidore's sanction 
as the slightest justification of an inference so contrary 
to all early ecclesiastical usage, as to suppose that 
because some of Peter's relics were merely " said," as 
St. Augustine justly remarks, to be deposited within his 
Roman tombs, our Lord's prediction of this apostle's 
martyrdom, by the Jews of the Dispersion, could not 
have been fulfilled, although St. Peter himself tells us 
that he was among the Jews of Babylon when this very 
martyrdom was impending. 

No other Roman-catholic writer but Cardinal Bellar- 
mine cites St. Isidore, and he only cites the words given ; 
because, though Isidore wrote other words, as did also 
Gregory of Tours, they are so exactly the words of 
Jerome's erroneous translation, from the 14th chapter of 
the 2nd book of the History by Eusebius, that they only 
prove this erroneous translation to have been all that 
existed in those times, to go upon for the hypothesis of 
Baronius, about the second year of Claudius. It is not 
to be wondered at, therefore, that none of the Roman 
clergy, not even Baronius, cite either this Gregory or 
Isidore upon this point, and still less is it to be wondered 
at that the cautious and discerning Bellarmine does not 
do so. 

Thus the conjecture in Eusebius was formed nearly 
SOOyears after Peter's time, and the first allusion in the 
Fathers to this conjecture does not occur until nearly 



270 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

300 years after it was formed. The next four writers 
mentioned, as adopting either the conjecture of Euse- 
bius, or the mistranslation of St. Jerome, are Bede in 
the eighth century, Ado in the ninth, Freculphus in 
the ninth, and Bernardus in the twelfth. Then follows 
the Golden Legend of the thirteenth century, which it 
will be seen was founded upon the patristic allegory of 
the Fiery Chariot. 

XXX. 

The Golden Legend, of the 13th century, in which 
Italy is mentioned as the scene of the Fiery Chariot, is 
supposed by Father M c Corry and the Correspondent in 
the Times to afford the clearest evidence of Peter's 
having been there. The incidents of this story are cau- 
tiously spoken of, in general terms only, by the former, as 
" the diabolical artifices" of the Samaritan, and by 
the latter, as " the important transactions" of St. 
Peter in Europe, for the truth of which they refer us 
to the Pseudo-Hegesippus and to " several others." I 
have already mentioned, in the progress of this Analysis, 
that all the Fathers, who advert to the Fiery Chariot of 
Samaria, speak of it as an allegory, and leave us to sup- 
pose the East as the scene of it ; and that the more en- 
lightened of the Eoman clergy have also regarded the 
story as an allegory, while the rest have rejected alto- 
gether the authority of those writers of the 13th and 
14th centuries, who alone place the scene of the events 
in Italy. And this will seem to most readers sufficient 
upon this subject. As, however, the two writers just 
mentioned, and, according to their accounts, a great 
many other Roman Catholics in Scotland and England 
as well as Ireland, regard this Golden Legend as a series 
of historical facts, and the mediaeval writers in question 
as really believing in the reality of what they told, and 
in Peter's having abandoned his mission to the Jews, it 
will not be inappropriate to give a detailed account here 
of the alleged facts, first mentioning the works in which 
they are to be found. 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 271 

The original author of the "Legenda Aurea," or 
" Golden Legends," is admitted, on all hands, to have 
been Jacobus de Voragine, a Roman-catholic archbishop 
at Genoa, (a.d. 1298,) portions of whose story about 
Peter were immediately caught up by various writers, 
both in the Greek and Latin churches. " The c Golden 
Legends' circulated extensively," says Father Tillemont, 
" and it was one of the books most frequently printed 
in the fifteenth century." Some of the copyists and 
editors seem however to have suppressed portions of the 
original, and to have interpolated a few marginal notes, 
mentioning, as corroborative testimonies, some of the 
spurious writings in which extracts of the story were 
given as soon as it appeared. The French version, Paris, 
1843, is the last edition of it. 

The greater part of the story about Peter in these 
Golden Legends is copied into a work called the " His- 
toria Apostolica," supposed by Baronius to have been 
written in the following century, and for some time 
attributed to Abdias, first archbishop of Babylon after 
the martyrdom of Peter. 

Baronius also attaches importance to the following, 
as corroborative authorities upon some parts of the 
story : — 

1. Nicephorus Callistus, in his "Ecclesiastical His- 
tory," written in the fourteenth century. 

2. The Pseudo-Marcellus, in the " Acts of Nereus and 
Achilles." Date unknown, but supposed to be the 
fourteenth or fifteenth century. 

3. The Pseudo-Hegesippus, in the work on "The 
Destruction of Jerusalem." Date unknown. This 
writer transcribed his statements, as any one can im- 
mediately perceive, clause by clause, but in better Latin, 
from the Pseudo-Abdias. 

4. Metaphrastes. Fourteenth century. 

5. Cedrenus. Date unknown, but supposed to be the 
thirteenth or fourteenth century. 

6. Glycas. Fourteenth century. 

To which we may add, the " Historia D. Petri," by 
Hieronymus Xavierus, originally written in the Persian 



272 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

language by this learned priest, near relative to St. 
Xavier, and appointed to an archbishopric by Philip III. 
of Spain. The annotations to the Protestant edition of 
this work were unfriendly to the See of Rome, which 
was the reason that that edition (the only one, I believe, 
yet published) was placed in the " Index Expurga- 
torius." Father Xavier died a.d. 1617. 
The story is as follows : — 

%\t Soften Ue^nb 

ABOUT 

THE LEARNED DOGS AND THE FIERY CHARIOT 

OF THE 

SAMARITAN IMPOSTOR AT ROME. 

Which is supposed by some moderns to place it beyond oil doubt that 
St. Peter and his daughter, St. Petronilla, came from Babylon 
to Europe in the reign of Nero. 

The Samaritan lived at Rome in great prosperity and 
comfort for nearly five-and-twenty years ; that is, from 
the commencement of the reign of Claudius until near the 
end of that of Nero, and acquired an immense reputation 
by his witchcrafts, among which it may be mentioned, as 
we are assured by Nicephorus, Cedrenus, Cardinal Baro- 
nius, and other writers approved of by the Roman church, 
that "he was in the constant habit of making statues walk, 
of changing everything into gold, of making the household 
utensils transfer themselves without being touched to 
wherever they were wanted ; of assuming the appearance 
of a dragon, a sheep, or anything else he chose, and of trans- 
forming other people into all kinds of animals," (Nicepho- 
rus, ii. 297.) Nothing was more usual, it appears, than to 
send for him in the case of death, to restore the anima- 
tion of deceased relatives ; and he was, as we may ima- 
gine, in the greatest possible favour, — nay, on the closest 
terms of intimacy and affection with the Emperor, who 
was at this time, as Baronius informs us, a liberal patron 
of everything like witchcraft. 

Towards the close of Nero's reign, when established 
at Rome under these favourable circumstances, the 
Samaritan was one day sitting in his study, with the far- 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 273 

famed Helen and some visitors, when he was surprised 
to see rush furiously into the room his immense dog — 
something, it would seem, between the Mont St. Ber- 
nard breed and the mastiff, but very savage, — which 
was usually kept chained in the porch of his house to 
keep off the crowds of people that, as may be supposed, 
were constantly nocking to his door. As this dog was 
known to have killed several people, it is easy to under- 
stand that Helen and her visitors felt uncomfortable at 
its rushing into the room in this manner. But what 
was their consternation when it stopped short in the 
middle of the room, and began to speak with the human 
voice, — not improbably in the Samaritan dialect, an- 
nouncing the apostle Peter from Babylon. It would 
seem that Helen and her visitors ran off in the utmost 
alarm, exclaiming, "What is this? — who is this?" — 
although her more philosophical partner conjured them 
not to be alarmed, and told Helen that, as she might have 
known, he could make the dog speak that way himself. 
Seeing, however, that it was no use, and that they were 
irrevocably off, — u Go, tell Peter to walk in," said he to 
the dog ; " and, I say, — be sure to speak to him like a man, 
as you have done to me. I'll not be outdone by the old 
fellow." Whereupon the dog went out, and almost im- 
mediately afterwards, the great apostle of the Jews, 
then nearly in his eightieth year (as Baronius tells us), 
entered the room, leaning on his staff, and with his grey 
hairs falling over his shoulders. A very amicable 
conversation ensued upon the omniscience of the angels, 
which will be found detailed in Glycas, (Ann. ii.,) 
who, as well as Cedrenus, Nicephorus, and others, gives 
the full account of this speaking dog. (Cedrenus writes 

thus : — Tov jULsyaXov AttogtoXov Ylerpov ty]v Ptefirjv KaraXa- 
£ovtoq Kai 7rpog tov Mayoy cnrcXOovToq, £vpt Kvva Tra/u/LLtytdt} 
csSe/lizvov aXvcru ev tw ttvXiovi ov o 2t/xwy occr/XTjcrac 01 avrov 

£Kb)Xv£ TTCLVTCLQ OVQ OVK TJ^eAe 7TjOO£ CLVTOV ZlGlSVCll' Kdl TOVTO t)V 

7rpu)Tov 6av/na rw jubXXovtl irpog ^Lijuuva eiaep^eaOai. O Se 

UzTpOQ l$(jJV TOV KVVa OVTlx) /ULEyClV Kai aTTYiypilV/iltVOV, Kai /LLdQldl/ 

oti ttoXXovq avsiXev ETTiysipriGavTaQ EiatXOeiv npo Ttjg ETriTpo7n}Q 

T 



274 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

^Li/uLtovoQ) KparY]Gaq eXvgev avTov Xtywv 4 ekteXOe 7rpog 
lLi}A(i)va Kai eitte avTO) av9p(i)Trivrj ^wi'p, TlETpog eigeXQeiv irpog 
<je OeXei." Kai tov Kvvog EvQvg cSpo/uo) uaeXOovrog /cat ovtoj 
XaXrjcravTog KaTETrXayri&av 01 jmsra ^i/ulwvoq, XeyovTzg, a Tig 
egti TlETpog Kai rig r\ rocfavTrj Swa/tug avTov f* irpog ovg (j>K]<ni> 
o Si^uwv, u tovto vfiag fxy] ^cijerw, oirEp Kayio ttoiy]gu)." Kai 
7rpocr£ra^£ rw kvvi avOpojiuvy (ftwvy eitveiv rw TLsTpoj eigeXQeiv. 
Kai tovto woirjaavTog iraXiv tov Kvvog, eigyiXOe TlETpog Trpog 
2iuwi>a, Kai Gv^aXojv jaetcl tov ^i/ncovog, eig OavjuaTOvpyiaVy 

&c. — Cedrenus. Hist. Comp.) 

But although the conversation had been amicable, the 
impostor soon proceeded to business with the apostle — 
soon proceeded to those u diabolical artifices," as Father 
M c Corry calls them, which were the great business of 
his life, and which called forth the " important trans- 
actions" of St. Peter. He sent for an immense bull, 
which was of course immediately brought to his hall 
door; and Peter, before he had time to look about him, 
was challenged by the Wizard to a contest of miracles 
in the presence of a great crowd of people, who had col- 
lected to see what was going forward at that well-known 
door. The Impostor whispered something into the bull's 
ear. The huge animal instantly dropped dead upon the 
pavement. The apostle said something, and the animal 
as instantly resumed its legs, looking as healthy and 
vigorous as before. The people shouted. " Life is a 
greater miracle than death," cried they, "to do, than to 
undo ;" and from that hour we hear of no more amicable 
conversations. From that hour the wizard looked upon 
the venerable apostle as his mortal foe. They, neverthe- 
less, had frequent encounters subsequently of the same 
supernatural character. All this is thus also attested by 

GedrenuS. (TlpoGTa^avTog tov ^ifj.(j)vog ayQrjvai clvtio Tavpov 
TrafifizyEQri EXaXrjGEV Eig to ovg avTov, Kai wapEvOv teQvtjkev o 
Tavpog. O &£ TlETpog Ev^a/LiEVog qyEipEV avTov. 01 &£ Xaoi 
i^ovTEg EBavfxaaav XEyovTEg, u aXr)0wg to Zwoyovrjaai viTEp to 
ZavaTioaai jjlei^ov zav/ma egti. Kai /liev toi Kai aXXa ari/uiEia 
Eiroir)crav rroXXa ov jlwvov ev Piojiip aXAa Kai ev ^vpia. — 

Cedrenus. Ibid.) 






THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 275 

It was not long afterwards that the Samaritan was 
sent for to revive a young Koman nobleman who had 
just died, a relative of the Emperor's. On entering the 
room, he, to his vexation, found Peter already there before 
him, who, on this occasion, assumed the initiative, and at 
once challenged the wizard to a contest of their powers 
in the resuscitation of the deceased, — a challenge which 
the other as promptly accepted. It was agreed that the 
Samaritan should begin. But exasperated apparently 
by the presence and challenge of the apostle, he insisted 
at the same time upon the condition that, if he succeeded 
the apostle should be put to death; adding that he was 
quite willing himself to be put to death, if, upon his 
failure, the apostle could succeed. This condition being 
agreed to in the presence of the countess (the deceased's 
mother) and a large assembly of afflicted relatives, all 
heathens, the Samaritan began. He advanced to the 
bed. He stooped close over the corpse. He repeated 
awful incantations into its ear ; and the head began to 
move, no one perceiving the impostor's hand behind it. 
" See ! — see !" cried every one — " He lives ! — he lives ! 
they are talking to one another!" The countess could 
hardly be kept back. The rest of those present began 
to attack Peter. But the diabolical artifice was frus- 
trated. This outburst of indignation did not terminate, 
as the Wizard expected, in the instant destruction of the 
defenceless old man from Babylon. u Be just," said the 
apostle, with firmness, " be just, and be silent. If he is 
alive, why does he not get up?" Misgivings arose. A 
pause ensued. The head continued nodding, and the 
impostor stooping over it. Impatience succeeded. 
a Take the Samaritan from the bed," said Peter, " and 
you will see that he deceives you." They did so. The 
head dropped back inanimate. The countess was in 
despair. The impostor was arrested in his endeavour to 
run down stairs. The whole room was in confusion. 
Amidst it all, the placid tones of the Galilaean were 
again heard, enjoining silence and forbearance. A breath- 
less expectation followed. All eyes were fixed on him. The 

t 2 



276 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

apostle, at a considerable distance from the bed, uttered 
a few words, and instantly afterwards the scion of the 
house of Nero rushed into his mother's arms. To stone 
the diabolical impostor was then what was uppermost in 
everybody's mind. But, " No," said Peter, " do not 
hurt him. Let him go. The exposure — the disgrace — 
is sufficient punishment." These occurrences are detailed, 
with many further particulars, out of Jacques de Vora- 
gine, by the Pseudo-Abdias, from whom they are tran- 
scribed, with very slight verbal alterations, into the 
Pseudo-Hegesippus. They are also fully recorded in 
Father Xavier, and are mentioned, as well as the rest of 
this legend, by Cardinal Baronius as incontestable facts. 
It would appear that either from conversion or from 
curiosity, some of the witnesses of this contest, among 
whom seem to have been Titus, the son of Vespasian, 
Nero's general near Babylon, and another young Roman 
nobleman named Flaccus, walked home with Peter to 
his house, where several of the Roman Christians used 
to lodge. It was the hour of the afternoon meal, and as 
a large party of them were enjoying themselves together, 
Titus, who sat near the apostle, inquired for his daughter, 
St. Petronilla. He had heard she was with him at 
Rome, he said, and was surprised not to see her doing the 
honours of her father's table. He had also heard, no 
doubt, though he did not say so, that she was very beau- 
tiful and accomplished. (Praestanti forma corporis. 
Marcellus. Juvenis et pulchras formae — de prasstantia 
format et vitas Celebris. Father Xavier.) u She is ill," 
said the apostle, u confined to her bed — has been a long 
time. She has had a paralytic stroke, with many feverish 
symptoms." " Dear me !" exclaimed the future con- 
queror of Jerusalem, " I am surprised to hear that. 
How is it that you who can, as we have just seen, do so 
much good for others, allow your amiable daughter, in 
the midst of her youth and beauty, to be so lono- an 
invalid?" The question seemed to annoy the old man; 
for it is not improbable that it was exactly on account 
of that very youth and great beauty that he kept her 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 277 

aloof from all the strangers who were constantly tempo- 
rary inmates of his house. He therefore answered rather 
short, "She is very well where she is." (C'est que cela con- 
vient. Jacques de Voragine. French version. Sic enim ei 
expedit. Marcellus.) But seeing that Titus was evidently 
dissatisfied with this account of the matter, and not wish- 
ing to do anything to disturb the faith of so influential a 
person, he added, after an uncomfortable pause of a few 
minutes : " It is a useful religious exercise, Titus, for my 
daughter to be in that condition ; but lest you should sup- 
pose it to result from inability on my part to effect her cure, 
you shall see her." Peter rose from the table, and going 
into an adjoining room, desired St. Petronilla to come 
in to dessert, or, as some of the writers express it, to come 
and wait upon them. (Ministrare. Marcellus.) Peter 
had not long returned to his chair, when Titus had the 
pleasure of seeing this fair child of the Euphrates enter 
the apartment. She appeared to be in her eighteenth 
year; was rather tall, and in the full bloom of health 
and extreme loveliness. She first ascertained that every 
one present was helped to what he wished for, and then 
seated herself quietly and gracefully in a vacant chair 
that had been placed by Titus for her near her father. 
It was now for the first time that this young Eoman and 
his friend Flaccus were able to contemplate undisturbed 
those magnificent Jewish features, with their engaging 
Eastern expression, and all that profusion of beautiful 
smooth black hair. What occurred while she was present, 
or what remarks, if any, passed between her and the com- 
pany, we are not told. But she had not been sitting 
long when the apostle said to her, " Go back, my love, 
to your bed and your afflictions." (Abi; in statu tuo 
mane. Father Xavier. Jussit earn Apostolus redire 
ad lectum suum. Marcellus.) She rose with a look 
which, although not a smile, seemed one for very sweet- 
ness — kissed her father, and bowing graciously to his 
friends, left the room. Whatever the Christians present 
might have thought of this, the two young heathen 
courtiers began each to ask himself if it might not pos- 



278 THE POSTNICEKE RECORDS. 

sibly have been a dream. She went, we are told, imme- 
diately to bed, and the paralytic afflictions of all kinds 
returned as bad as ever. This account is given out of 
Jacobus de Voragine by the Pseudo- Abdias, the Fseudo- 
Hegesippus, and the Pseudo-Marcellus. It is also given 
in Father Xavier and others ; all which accounts agree 
as to the lady's youth and extraordinary beauty. For 
what reason Cardinal Baronius should be so un gallant as 
to maintain, in opposition to them all, that she was both 
old and ugly — that she must have been at least sixty, and 
that a person of that age, constantly suffering from ill- 
ness, as she was, could have had very little beauty left, 
it is not easy to see nor worth while here to examine. 
Suffice it to say, that he has not one single authority 
upon his side. The reader will do well to refer to Baro- 
nius upon this point ; as he even insinuates that if she 
were so very beautiful, she might not have been the 
apostle's daughter at all. 

This ecclesiastical miracle had scarcely passed off — the 
bright apparition that it brought has scarcely vanished — 
when the meditations of the assembly were disturbed by 
the arrival of an Imperial Messenger. The apostle was 
summoned to the presence of the Emperor. Titus, 
Flaccus, and all present, except the undaunted Peter, 
stood aghast; for no one trusted Nero. To explain 
matters, however, we must go back a little. 

As soon as the Samaritan escaped from the scene of 
the morning's tumult, he ran as fast as he could run to 
the palace, demanded an audience of his imperial friend, 
and implored him to send at once for that insolent 
Galilaean, — that, if he did not, they would have Rome 
again in flames. Nero had, we are told, a very great 
affection for this wicked fellow-heathen ; and, partly to 
soothe the agitation of a friend, whom we are told he 
looked upon as the greatest safeguard of the state, 
partly, however, it may be presumed, to gratify his own 
curiosity as to the sort of person this was, that was said 
to have that very day revived a near relative of the im- 
perial family, he did send for Peter. The messenger just 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 279 

mentioned was despatched, and, after a very short interval, 
during which the Enchanter stalked impatiently about 
the Presence-chamber, the venerable apostle of Babylon 
entered, and stood for the first time in the dreaded 
presence of the Chief of Eome. u I cannot tolerate this 
enemy any longer, Caesar," said the Samaritan, under 
much excitement, as Peter entered ; " and I wonder very 
much that one so discerning as you are should save from 
the general persecution this stupid and treacherous old 
fisherman, (miror te Caesar nunc alicujus momenti 
hominem existimare imperitum piscatorem mendacis- 
simum, &c.,) who possesses no power, either in word or 
deed, and who this very morning pretended to revive 
your relative, when it was, as I have told you, by my 
science alone that this was done. Let me order my 
angels to come at once and deliver me from him." " I 
do not fear your angels," said Peter, quietly; " on the 
contrary, it is they fear me." — "What!" said Nero to 
the apostle, unaccustomed to hear his frieud thus set at 
defiance, " do you not fear one who proves to us by his 
actions that he is one of our gods?" and the impostor 
strutted about the room as before, full of indignation. 
" If there is anything divine about him," said Peter, 
" let him tell what I am thinking of, or what I am going 
to do ; and I shall first whisper to you, most excellent 
Caesar, what it is, so that this time at least he will not 
be able to impose upon you." — " Come close to me, then," 
said the Emperor, nothing startled at this overture; 
" come close, and tell me what your thought is," (qu'il 
me dise ce que je pense, et je vais confier a ton oreille 
la pensee que j'ai en mon esprit, et il ne pourra nous 
tromper. Neron dit : approche-toi et dis-moi ce que 
tu penses. Jacques de Voragine. — French translation 
Paris. 1843.) " Tell them to bring me some barley 
bread," said Peter, in a very low whisper to the Em- 
peror's ear, " and to give it to me without his seeing it." 
Nero had become interested in the singularity of the 
proceedings. The servant received the orders outside 
the door, at Nero's desire, from the apostle ; who, waiting 



280 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

outside the door until the bread was brought to him, 
put it in his pocket (sous sa tunique), except a little of 
it that he hid in his two fists, (in dextra atque sinistra 
manica sua collocaverat. ) He then re-entered the room, 
carefully closing the door after him, and presenting his 
•fists to the Samaritan, said, " Now, then, tell me what I 
have here, and what I have been doing and saying." — 
" Well, my good friend," said the Emperor, seeing that 
his protege did nothing but stare at the two fists, " what 
do you say to that ? What Peter says seems fair enough." 
— " Let Peter tell me what I have been thinking of and 
doing," said the wily impostor, somewhat embarrassed. 
— "So I will," said Peter, addressing Nero ; " but let 
him tell me first." — " You must know, my dear Em- 
peror," (bone Imperator), said the Samaritan, seeing 
that Nero expected him to say something, " you must 
know that no creature can tell that. — Peter is a liar." — 
" But you consider yourself more than a mere creature," 
said Peter; " so tell, even in a whisper to the Emperor, 
what it is I have here." The impostor had the good 
luck to avoid this trap, and turned away. As to what 
the Emperor thought of all this hesitation on his friend's 
part, our story leaves us a good deal in the dark ; but 
the end of the matter was, that the testy impostor be- 
came furious at having the apostle's two fists thrust into 
his face at every turn, as he strutted about the room, 
with the everlasting question, " Come, tell me my 
thought?" So, forgetting the respect that was due to 
the Emperor, he roared out at last, in a voice like 
thunder, u Let my big dogs come and eat him up." 
Whereupon, the doors and windows being all at the time 
closed, two enormous dogs suddenly tumbled down the 
chimney and rushed at the apostle. Peter stretched out 
his hands open towards them, showing them the barley 
bread in his palms, and backing them in this manner 
about the room, as he had just before done with clenched 
hands to the infuriated Samaritan. The effect of this 
upon the animals was to make them rush off again by 
the same way they came, to the great astonishment and 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 281 

disappointment of their wicked master. Some doubt 
has been raised as to whether the apostle's gesture is 
sufficient to account for the abrupt exit of the dogs on 
this occasion ; but there appears no good reason to doubt 
it. It certainly is not impossible that the rest of the 
loaf which Peter had in his tunic fell out, unobserved by 
the Samaritan, and was caught up by one of the dogs, 
which, naturally running oiF with his prize, was im- 
mediately pursued by the other. This, indeed, is not 
impossible ; but there is no excuse for the impious ex- 
planation which some have given of this matter. " Thus, 
Emperor," said Peter, " I have shown you, not in word 
but in deed, what it was that the Samaritan was think- 
ing of. He was thinking of these dogs when he talked 
of calling down his angels to destroy me, showing that 
his angels are only dogs." Nero does not seem to have 
much appreciated any portion of this performance. He 
ordered them both to quit his presence, calling them 
several hard names, one of which seems to have been 

" teratologoi," (w? TeparoXoyovg kcu a/ntyoTspovg ek Trpo<j(07rov 

avrov Scittov E%r)\a(jEv. Cedrenus. Hist. Comp.,) and re- 
quested them not to annoy him with any more of their 
ecclesiastical miracles ; that he would not have it. Many 
further particulars of this part of the story are given by 
Jacques de Voragine in the Golden Legend, as well as by 
the Pseudo-Abdias, Father Xavier, and various others. 

The disgrace into which his dogs brought him on this 
occasion was a severe blow to the Samaritan, and he 
resolved to have revenge on the apostle. It happened 
that there was a priest at Rome named Marcellus, a 
very intimate friend of Peter's, whom the apostle was in 
the habit of visiting at a stated hour every day, — a little 
after one o'clock, (post horam unam. Marcellus.) The 
Samaritan took the largest and most savage of the four 
dogs he had — one that had not yet seen Peter, and tied 
it in the porch of this priest's house, just before the hour 
for Peter to make his visit, in the hope that it would 
tear him to pieces when he attempted to go in. The 
apostle soon came up. Of course the dog Sew at him, 



282 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

barking and howling in the most terrific manner. Peter 
saw at once what had been done. He succeeded in tran- 
quillizing the brute, and having untied him, told him to 
go tell his master that he had better give up his dia- 
bolical artifices, — unfortunately adding that he was to 
be sure not to hurt any one until he reached him. The 
dog, it seems, misunderstood this part of what the 
apostle said, and thought it meant he was to attack him 
as soon as he found him. So the moment he came up 
to where his wicked master was watching the success of 
this manoeuvre, he rushed at him, knocked him down, 
and was so intent upon tearing his garments, that he 
would certainly have choked him, but that Peter, per- 
ceiving in some way or other what was happening, 
hastened to the spot, and told the dog on no account to 
hurt his master. The dog obeyed the letter of the 
apostle's mandate, but tore the Samaritan's clothes in 
such an unaccountable manner that not one single shred 
of anything remained upon him. (Corpus quidem non 
attigit sed vestes adeo laceravit ut nulla pars corporis 
tecta maneret. Marcellus.) In this deplorable state he 
got up a very Adam, from the pavement; and seeing 
the condition in which he was, ran off at the top of his 
speed towards the nearest of the gates of Rome, with a 
great crowd of little boys hallooing after him ; and what 
was still worse, his own terrible dog not very far behind. 
(Populus vero et imprimis pueri una cum cane eum 
insectantes extra urbis moenia seu lupum expulerunt. 
Marcellus.) It is most probable that Helen heard of 
what had happened to him and sent him clothes immedi- 
ately, but he did not make his appearance again for 
some time (some accounts say for nearly a year) 
within the walls of Rome. 

During this interval an event of sad domestic interest 
occurred to the apostle. St. Petronilla regained her 
health, and was now often to be seen engaged in the 
domestic duties that devolved upon her in her father's 
house, but it had been long manifest to the Christian 
community at Rome, that both her father and herself 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 283 

were averse to her forming a matrimonial alliance. 
Nothing of the kind therefore was proposed from any 
quarter of the Christian world. She was, nevertheless, 
seen by many of the Roman court ; and in her case, as 
in that of so many others, to be seen was to be loved. 
Among her heathen admirers, the most importunate 
was Count Flaccus, who, after frequent fruitless efforts 
to obtain her consent to marry him, surrounded the 
apostle's house one day with an escort of dragoons, and 
alighting from his horse, entered unannounced and im- 
petuously, into the lady's presence. Her friend Felicola 
was with her. " This day, my beloved Petronilla, must 
be the term of my wretchedness. This day you become 
my wife. There is a carriage and an escort at the door. 
The Emperor consents — nay, commands, (added he, with 
the appropriate look and emphasis. ) Your father will 
not have the madness to oppose the Emperor." — The 
poor girl was terrified at all this, but most of all at those 
last words. If she feared anything on earth, it was that 
her father should incur the displeasure of the dreadful 
Nero. — "What ! my Lord," said she, promptly, and with 
admirable firmness, " do you come in this manner, with 
an armed force, against an unarmed girl ? — For shame, 
my Lord ! — Allow me at least to form the acquaintance of 
those Roman ladies by whom, according to the customs 
of your country, I am to be conducted to my new home. 
Allow me at least three whole days, and send me my 
twelve bridesmaids to visit me and to be my friends. 
You cannot treat me thus;" — and Petronilla here shed a 
flood of large bright tears, without seeking to arrest, to 
dry, or to conceal them. There are cases in which it is 
said that the lion will " turn and flee," and this seems 
to have been one of them. The armed soldier trembled. 
He felt — those convincing tears had taught him — that he 
had been wanting in consideration to her he loved. He 
promised to do what she desired, — to wait — to hope — 
to do anything but cause those tears. He withdrew his 
troops. He bade her an affectionate adieu ; — for three 
long days he was not now to see her. Upon his de- 



284 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

parture, however, St. Petronilla instantly renounced this 
world and everything by which we hold on to it. All 
the entreaties — all the tears of Felicola could not induce 
her to take food ; and on no account was her father to 
be apprized of anything. One after another the twelve 
fair Patricians called and had their interviews with 
Petronilla ; and such was the winning power of grief, 
and gentleness, and truth, that every one of them suc- 
cessively, before leaving the house, requested the apostle 
to baptize her. On the third morning, they all arrived 
together. The beautiful orphan of the East was at her 
prayers by her bedside. They saw her — they stood around 
her-;— they disturbed her not. " The Christians make 
long prayers" thought these bright-eyed converts of the 
Capitol. a Why do you weep?" said one of them, to Fe- 
licola; "your friend is not going far." — "She is gone 
far — she has left me for ever," said the disconsolate 
girl, bursting into an agony of tears. " She has been 
at those prayers since the day dawned." It was but 
too true. They raised the face. Petronilla was no 
more ! It is unnecessary to say that the usual amount 
of consternation and bewilderment upon these occasions 
ensued, — that Flaccus was sent for and duly ushered 
into his despair ; but to the discredit of human nature, 
it must be told that he immediately transferred his 
affections to Felicola, and that upon her refusal to take 
her dear friend's place in his heart and home, he com- 
passed both her death, and even that of her dear friend, 
the priest who gave her absolution. This affecting 
portion of Jacques de Voragine's narrative, is also given 
in the Acts of Nereus and Achilles, by Marcellus, as 
quoted by Baronius. It is likewise to be found in Father 
Xavier, and several others. 

But the venerable apostle had little time for sorrow. 
His daughter's relics were scarcely deposited upon the 
Ostian Road, in the catacombs there, before the Sa- 
maritan was again in the field against him, with fresh 
projects, and the accumulated resentment of many 
brooding hours. This bad man's first step on re-enter- 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 285 

ing Rome was to solicit a private audience of the 

Emperor, which he seems to have obtained with the 

usual facility. " I know," said he, as he entered the 

Presence-chamber, " I know, most excellent Caesar, how 

much right you have to question my supernatural 

powers, and to disbelieve my pretensions, but I have not 

come to you this time without my proofs. Order them 

to cut off my head." After a pause, during which the 

two stared at one another, the impostor proceeded, — 

" Yes, — I am in earnest. Order them to cut off my 

head ; and you shall see that the power of life and death 

is in my hands. In a few days afterwards I shall call 

on you again. Nero, tired of the farce which had been 

so long played at his expense, and which seemed to be 

now beginning again as bad as ever, took him at his 

word. The chief executioner of the palace was ordered 

to decapitate the Samaritan after the most approved 

manner, in one of the out-buildings of the court-yard. 

Baronius and other writers inform us, as has been 

already mentioned, that the impostor was constantly in 

the habit of transforming himself into various kinds of 

animals ; and was always expected to do something of 

the kind by those in whose society he was. We must 

not, therefore, wonder to find that the executioner, who 

seems to have detested this pest of man as much as any 

one, believed himself subjected to some diabolical artifice 

of the kind on this occasion. The Samaritan was before 

him with his head held down. The executioner merely 

turned round an instant to whet his scimitar, and on 

again looking round, he saw a great ram with its head 

held down by the attendants. " But where is the 

Samaritan?" said he, fiercely. — " Behold him, sir," said 

the attendants. " We have never let this head go." — 

" That is not a man," said the executioner, getting 

angry. — " What else is it, sir?" said the attendants. 

" It seems to us to be a man." — He shall not escape 

then, this time," said the executioner, who considered 

that his master had been sadly humbugged by these 

transformations before; and without another word, the 



286 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

head was instantly severed from the body. "It is to 
be hoped that we shall hear no more of this confounded 
Samaritan," said he, wiping his scimitar, and restoring it 
to its scabbard. As was usual on these occasions, the exe- 
cutioner had an audience to apprize Nero in person that 
the deed was duly done, which seemed to afford great satis- 
faction to both these bloodthirsty creatures. Within 
four or five days, however, the inexhaustible Samaritan 
again entered the presence-chamber of the astounded 
Nero. " Why," said he, coolly, on going into the room, 
" what is this for, Nero? You have not yet given them 
orders to wipe up my blood. I have just been looking 
at the place where they cut off my head the other day, 
and it is quite disgusting to see it. Do send them to 
wipe it up." Nothing could exceed the amazement of 
the Emperor. He held out his hand to him. He assured 
him that he should never doubt him any more, but it 
was too late. The Samaritan was offended — nay, worse 
— he was hurt. " Adieu, my dear friend," said he to 
Nero, as he turned to depart. " A long — long adieu. 
I shall leave Rome to-morrow, in my fiery chariot, and 
you shall never see me any more." — " Impossible," ex- 
claimed Nero. " No my dear fellow, this cannot be, 
we cannot spare you. I cannot, in this manner, lose the 
greatest safeguard of the state. You must not leave 
me ;" and the Emperor became deeply affected. — "Well," 
said the Samaritan, relenting, " since you wish it so 
much, I shall return, — I shall return with good things 
for Rome ; but my four-in-hand is ordered for to- 
morrow, and I have many reasons for wishing to make 
a short visit to the skies." — " Let it be as short as pos- 
sible," said Nero; "farewell, until to-morrow. I shall go 
to see you off; and when you return, I promise you that 
you shall not be any more tormented by these Baby- 
lonians and Galilaeans." 

The morrow came. A magnificent chariot and four, in 
an atmosphere of unconsuming fire (quadrigae igneae) 
very much, the Romans thought, like Phaeton's chariot 
and four of old, awaited the Samaritan at a tower on the 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 287 

top of the Capitoline Hill. The sparkling wings of the 
impatient steeds produced a beautiful effect. The day 
was fine, and the people flocked in dense crowds from all 
parts of Rome to the foot of the Hill. Conspicuous, 
however, amidst that immense assembly, was to be seen 
the luxurious, though more ponderous, equipage of 
the Emperor, in which he was sitting, with one or 
two of his friends, surrounded by the various carriages 
of the Court; and at a humble distance behind it, 
yet within hail, might be seen the apostle Peter, and 
with him St. Paul, who, some accounts tell us, had 
returned a day or two before from Spain. At length 
the Wizard of Samaria appeared upon the tower, arrayed 
in a garment of light, with a crown of laurel on his 
head. " Farewell, Romans," said he, never much 
celebrated for his eloquence ; " farewell. I am sorry 
you make such fools of yourselves about those con- 
temptible Galileans, and allow yourselves to be hum- 
bugged by them. But since you do, I am determined 
not to stay here to witness it. Whenever you act differ- 
ently I shall return, and bring you some good things 
from the regions of the sky. My only request is, that 
you take care of my beloved Helen, who, wherever I go, 
is always, as I have often told you, my first thought.'' 1 
(It is supposed that this last expression had some 
mysterious meaning in it, on which see Baronius.) He 
mounted the chariot (conscensis quadrigis igneis), the 
wings of the impatient horses, streaming with fire, 
waved gently but powerfully through the unyielding 
air ; and, like an enormous but radiant bird, such as we 
read of in fairy stories, the Samaritan and his flying 
chariot gained the upper strata of our atmosphere, (ab 
ilia turri excelsa avolans, in modum volucrium, sublime 
petiit.) The people shouted loud vivats for the Samaritan. 
" There," exclaimed Nero, rising up in his carriage, and 
turning round to Peter and Paul, " look at that. I 
told you that what that man said was true, and you — 
you are but impostors," (vous — vous n'etes que des inv 
posteurs,) added he, impatiently, as he re-adjusted himself 



288 THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 

in his carriage to watch the flight of his aerial friend. 
The apostles looked at each other. " What shall we 
do?" said Paul. — "See where he is now," said Peter. 
(Leve la tete et vois — oculos tuos attolle et vide.) " I 
see well enough," said Paul. " He will soon be out of 
sight if you don't make haste. What on earth are you 
ingfor?" (pourquoi t'arretes-tu ? Acheve;) we are told 
that Peter became here nervous and agitated, (fy ayowia 
paWov r]v. Nicephorus.) Some of the writers defend his 
hesitation, by suggesting that it was very probably in- 
tentional, in order that the flight being the higher, the 
fall might be the greater, and Peter's share of the eccle- 
siastical miracle (viz. the Samaritan's not being killed 
by the fall), the more striking. At length the Emperor 
and the crowd, which was very great in the neighbour- 
hood of his carriage, heard Peter's well-known voice: 
" Angels of Satan," said the apostle, " you majf let him 
fall now. The flight has lasted long enough. Let him 
fall, angels of Satan, but let him live." The chariot and 
horses were never seen again. They vanished into thin 
air (quadrigas igneas Petri ore difflatas evanuisse), and 
the impostor dropped from the very clouds like a stone; 
yet, wonderful to relate, (and this we must not forget 
was Peter's principal share in the so-called miracle.) ac- 
cording to the best accounts, he only sustained a simple 
fracture of both his legs; though some indicate other 
portions of him as injured by the fall; and it was not 
until some time afterwards that he died, when, distracted 
by mental and bodily sufferings, he managed, in some 
equally miraculous manner, to drag himself to the 
window of his room, at the top of a house in some 
other town, and throwing himself out, was killed on 
the spot. When Nero heard of this, he had Peter 
arrested, and kept him some time in prison, to see 
whether the Samaritan would re-appear; for Nero, 
naturally enough, fully expected that he would, he 
had been so used to his re-appearing. The hope, how- 
ever, was at length abandoned. He considered he had 
been robbed of his best friend ; and thus even after death 



THE POSTNICENE RECORDS. 289 

this diabolical impostor persecuted the apostle; for 
Nero was vindictive, and Peter was put to death upon 
an inversed cross. On which occasion, we are told, that 
the apostle made a long speech, notwithstanding the in- 
convenience of the posture in which he was fastened; 
and that among the aerial forms that hovered round 
him, one was seen handing him a book; but how he 
took it, or what he did with it, we are not told. It is 
not, however, improbable, that it may now be in the 
library of the Vatican. Nor are we told what became 
of Helen or of the dogs after this ; but we may reason- 
ably conclude that Nero did not leave these sole de- 
pendants of his lost friend unprovided for. Indeed, it 
is but too probable that he appropriated the dogs, for he 
was fond, we are informed, of everything that was savage. 
Several minor matters occur while Peter was in prison, 
for which we have not room here, but which the curious 
will find in the original work by Jacques de Voragine. 

Upon the evidence of Peter's being believed to have 
left the East which the foregoing story is supposed to 
afford, it is unnecessary to raise any discussion. The 
Legend shows that the archbishop of Genoa had read 
the conjecture of Eusebius in some of the translations, 
if not in the original ; but it affords not the slightest 
reason for thinking that he acquiesced in it, or that he 
supposed any one else did. A statement made in that 
Legend is not only no sign of the statement's being true, 
but no sign even of its being a tradition. The work is 
too late and too manifestly a mere fiction. Nicephorus 
Callistus, in his Ecclesiastical History, Metaphrastes, and 
various other writers of the same period, as Jacobus de 
Voragine, state, in works of much higher credit, that 
Peter came to England, and that, while he lived among 
us, he founded several churches here; yet what Koman 
Catholic will pretend to regard this as a sign that there 
must have been a tradition of Peter's having been in 
England? I need not, however, enlarge upon a point 
so obvious. I have no doubt that Father M c Corry and 
the Correspondent in the Times are utterly mistaken as 

u 



290 THE POSTINICENE RECORDS. 

to the state of education in Great Britain and Ireland ; 
and utterly mistaken when they suppose that any class 
of the community — Protestant or anti-Protestant — in 
these Islands, will, in the 19th century, accept such a 
frivolous guarantee as this story of the Fiery Chariot 
for the apostolic authenticity of the chains which they 
now seek to cast around us, or will even easily excuse 
the imputation of so much credulity and so much 
ignorance as are attributed to us in the promulgation of 
such an argument. 



APPENDIX. 



THE EIGHT 

PRINCIPAL COLLECTIONS 

OF THE 

ALLEGED TESTIMONIES, 

WITH SHORT NOTES. 



I. — Bakonius. 

(From the Annals, a.d. 44, paragraph 25.) 

M To ascertain into what countries each of the apostles 
went, we shall cite all that we can find in the Fathers or 
elsewhere. And above all we must speak of Peter, who, 
according to the general opinion, (communis sententia,) 
came to Rome in the second year of Claudius ; for that 
is attested, first of all by Eusebius (a.d. 340) in his 
Chronicon; that is attested also by St. Jerome (a.d. 
420), and afterwards, by all who have written the 
history of that event. (See Latin Translation of the 
4 Chronicon, 7 by Jerome, and the c Ecclesiastical Writers,' 
translated from Eusebius by Jerome, art Peter.) All 
other historians have written the same thing of the 
peculiar time of his going, so that there is no more room 
left for doubt or contradiction upon these points ; and, 
in the same manner, all the ecclesiastical writers have 
confirmed this same Peter's journey to Rome, and have 
adorned it with everlasting records, viz. — 

Sixteen Latin writers: 

Tertullian, Arnobius, 

Cyprian, Lactantius, 

u2 



292 APPENDIX. 

Optatus, Philastrius, 

Jerome, Orosius, 

Ambrose, Prosper, 

Augustine, Maximus, 

Sulpitius, Chrysologus, 

Prudentius, Arator. 

Eleven Greek writers : 

Papias, Eusebius, 

Caius, Chrysostom, 

Dionysius of Corinth, Cyril of Alexandria, 

Irenaeus, Theodoret, 

Hippolytus, Sozomem 
Petrus of Alexandria, 

" In short, not to lose time in a thing so evident, all the 
general councils have confirmed this great fact, — all the 
bishops of Rome in their letters, and all the emperors in 
their edicts, have confirmed it; (to dismiss the matter 
with a single word), the event was of such vast import- 
ance, that it was most deservedly recorded in writings of 
every description; so that no brazen faced heretic or 
schismatic until now has dared to raise even the least 
doubt about this journey." 

Note. — 1. No one could be expected to contradict 
what no one had asserted. Not one Bishop of Rome 
has even alluded to the alleged tradition in his letters ; — 
not one Emperor mentions it in his edicts. 2. The two 
writers he puts forward as highest authority, are both 
of too late a period to be any authority at all, even if 
they had made the statement. 3. Neither of the state- 
ments attributed to them, however, belong to either of 
them ; that attributed to Jerome being merely a transla- 
tion from another writer, and that attributed to Eusebius 
not being in any of his works. 4. Saying that a certain 
matter was attested by all who wrote of it, is not saying 
that anybody did so. 5. Baronius was deceived about 
several books in his time, since discovered to be spurious ; 
and, 6, as to the Fathers having made Europe the scene 
of the allegory about the Fiery Chariot, not one of them 
does so. 



APPENDIX. 293 



II — Bellarmine. 

(De Summ. Pontif., lib. ii. c. 1, 2, and 3.) 

u We have four questions here to consider. 1. Was 
Peter at Kome at all? 2. Did he die there? 3. Was 
he bishop there? 4. Was he never translated from that 
See to any other ? Of these four, it is the last only that 
is either absolutely necessary for the papal supremacy, 
or sufficient to establish it. For as to the first, it is 
clearly neither necessary nor sufficient for the purpose 
we have in view, as many people come to Kome without 
being bishops of that city, and many bishops of Kome 
have never been in that city at all, as Clemens V., &c. 
As to the second, that also is neither necessary nor suffi- 
cient, as is proved by the facts that many bishops of 
Rome did not die at Kome, and that many other people 
who never were bishops of the city, die daily within its 
walls, &c. But, as the four points above mentioned 
can be proved, I shall here indicate the peculiar argu- 
ments of each. 

" 1 . To begin, then, from the beginning. Peter's hav- 
ing been at Kome is proved, first, by Peter's own 
testimony in 1 Pet. v. 13; for that this Epistle was 
written from Kome, and that Rome is here called Babylon, 
we have the assurance of Papias, as is mentioned by 
Eusebius, (ii. 15,) and of Jerome, as is mentioned in the 
c List of Ecclesiastical Writers/ art. Mark ; in which way 
it is also explained by Bede and (Ecumenius, and all 
who have written commentaries on this Epistle. Besides, 
St. John calls Rome 4 Babylon' everywhere in his Apo- 
calypse. 

" 2. Our second argument is, that the point in ques- 
tion is proved from the last chapter of the Acts of the 
Apostles, and from the Epistle to the Romans. For 
from these it is evident that there were several Christians 
— in short, a large and flourishing church at Rome before 



294 APPENDIX. 

Paul came there. I should like to know, therefore, who 
made these converts, if Peter had not been at Rome to 
do so? For many of the ancients tell us, that Peter 
was the first of all who proclaimed the gospel to the 
Romans, and that he had founded that church before 
Paul went to Rome ; and it cannot be proved by any 
satisfactory evidence, that any one else did so. 

" 3. Our third argument is founded upon the history 
that we possess respecting Mark's gospel. For authors 
of the highest authority agree in relating, that Mark 
wrote the gospel at Rome, as he had heard Peter pro- 
claim it there." (Here follow the names of the same 
writers as are cited by Baronius, Papias, Irenaeus, Cle- 
ment of Alexandria, &c. ) 

"4. Our fourth proof of Peter's having been at Rome 
is, the history of the Samaritan impostor, the reality of 
which has been already demonstrated from the writings 
of many of the ancients. (The proofs given by Baro- 
nius that this was not an allegory, are mentioned by 
Bellarmine in another part of his work. ) 

" 5. Our fifth argument consists of all the clear proofs 
that we have of Peter's having died at Rome ; for he 
could not have died there if he had never been there. 
And the first of these is his tomb being there. For if 
Peter did not die at Rome, who carried his body there? 
From whence, and when, and in whose presence, was it 
carried there? But if it be answered that there is no 
reason for supposing that the apostle's body is at Rome 
at all, where, then, I should like to know, is it? We do 
not hear of its being anywhere else; nor is it at all 
probable that the body of one of the principal apostles 
should have been neglected, when the bodies of so many 
other saints have been so carefully preserved. Eusebius, 
ii. 25, looked upon this argument as so complete and 
final a proof of Peter's having been put to death at 
Rome, that he did not produce any other. (Hoc argu- 
mentum tanti fecit Eusebius ut superfluum putaverit 
alia quserere.) And that Peter's body was really at 
Rome, is proved by its being thought by all mankind to 



APPENDIX. 295 

be there ; as we may see from the pilgrimages that were 
made to that part of St. Peter's which is called the 
' Limina Apostolorum,' (viz., the vault beneath the chief 
altar. ) 

"But further; our adversaries dp not deny that it 
was always believed, till the fourteenth century, that 
Peter had been at Rome. Now, it is utterly incredible 
that there should have been no one in all that time to 
expose the error, if it was an error ; especially as it was 
nothing that was done in a corner, or in an instant of 
time, or without witnesses, so as to be either easy to feign, 
or difficult to disprove. How is it to be believed that 
this event, which was, as we maintain, so universally 
known, should have been false, and no one found during 
fourteen centuries to show that it was a mistaken sup- 
position?" (Here follows a list of supposed testimonies, 
in which he thought it better to omit the nine following 
that Baronius gave — viz., Hippolytus, Cyprian, Optatus, 
Prudentius (in Peristeph.), Prosper, Chrysologus, Petrus 
of Alexandria, Cyrillus of Alexandria, and Sozomen; 
and in which he added the ten following, chiefly very 
late writers, that Baronius thought it wiser to leave out — 
viz., Ignatius, Hegesippus, Athanasius, Eutropius, Pau- 
linus, Isidore, Leo, Gregory of Tours, Pope St. Gregory 
the Great, and a Roman lady whose name was Elpis. ) 

Note. — 1. This cardinal does not think it necessary 
that Peter should have been in Europe, in order that a 
Roman-catholic church should subsist anywhere. 2. He 
(like Baronius) does not seem to have read the Greek 
Fathers, except in modern translations, which led to his 
making many mistakes about them. 3. Neither Papias 
nor Jerome says, as he supposes, that we are to under- 
stand the city of Rome by the city of Babylon in 1 Peter. 
Not one of the Greek or Latin Fathers, even in their 
commentaries on this Epistle, says so, and he tacitly ad- 
mits that even Eusebius does not. 4. When he asks, who 
made the first Roman converts if Peter was not in Europe 
to do so? he forgets Acts ii. 5. He is mistaken in suppos- 
ing that any one of the Fathers says Mark's Gospel was 
written in Italy. Not one does so. 6. Also in supposing 



296 ' APPENDIX. 

that any of them assert the reality of the story about the 
Fiery Chariot. Even the writers of the thirteenth, four- 
teenth and fifteenth centuries (though they wrote the story 
out more fully), never intended their words to be under- 
stood as of a reality. 7. As to what he says of Eusebius's 
celebrated conjecture, and Peter's tomb at Rome, the 
cardinal is hardly as candid as usual. He acknowledges, 
indeed, that this was the great argument of Eusebius, the 

ONLY ARGUMENT THAT WRITER EMPLOYED; but when he 

asks, would there have been so many pilgrimages to Peter's 
tomb, if his body was not in it ? and, if it was not there, 
where was it ? and, again, if Peter did not die at Rome, 
can any one tell us who carried his relics there ? these are 
questions which every honest Roman Catholic can easily 
answer. 8. In his conclusion he incautiously adverts to 
the main prop by which the story of a tradition has been 
upheld. Our adversaries do not deny that the tra- 
dition existed. To this the answer is plain. There was 
so much else connected with the alleged tradition, and 
upon the face of it, that was untrue and preposterous, 
that the comparatively little question, whether it ever 
existed, was passed over as unimportant. 



III. — Father Francis Feuardent. 

(Notes on Irenseus 7 b. in,, c. 3.) 

u IreN/EUS distinctly asserts in the first chapter of this 
book, that Peter proclaimed the gospel at Rome, and 
laid the foundations of that church, which is confirmed 
with wonderful unanimity, before his* time, by Hegesippus, 
Caius, Linus, Clemens, Anacletus, and Papias, and also 
by all the orthodox and illustrious writers that came 
after him, whether in the East or in the West, in the 
North or in the South. And this being the case, I 
cannot but wonder at the abandoned effrontery with 
which Velanus, Illyricus, Funccius, and other French 
Protestants, have the impudence to jabber about Peter's 
having never been at Rome." 

Note. — 1. He candidly confesses, that the most con- 



APPENDIX. 297 

vincing argument for Peter's having left the East was 
Ireneeus's statement (supported as it was by other 
writers), viz., that Peter proclaimed the tidings of 
salvation at Rome, and that he founded the church there. 
The answer is in Acts ii. 2. He was mistaken in suppos- 
ing that we have a single word of the writings of Hege- 
sippus, Linus, or Anacletus ; and the reader has seen in 
what way the names of Clemens Romanus, Papias, and 
Caius have been brought into this discussion. 



IV. — Henry de Yalois. 

(Notes on Eusebius, b. ii. c. 15.) 

" Nothing within the whole range of ecclesiastical history 
is better known (illustrius), nothing more certain or 
better proved, than that Peter went to Rome. For, 
besides Papias and Clement of Alexandria, whose testi- 
mony is here adduced by Eusebius, the same thing is 
stated by Dionysius of Corinth, Irenasus, Caius, and 
Origen. The attentive reader will find the passages 
from all these writers proving what I have said, intro- 
duced by Eusebius in different portions of his history.'' 

Note. — 1. He seems to have laid it down as a principle, 
that facts in ecclesiastical history do not require the 
same amount of proof as other facts; a doctrine which 
no one will, I think, concede to him. 2. He admits that 
we shall find nothing more satisfactory in the present 
case than the six passages of writers cited on other 
points by Eusebius. The reader will, therefore, do well 
to direct his minutest attention to these six passages, for 
the authority of Valesius in his church is deservedly veiy 
great. 3. He considers that Eusebius himself is too 
late a writer to have any weight in the controversy. 



V. — Bishop Pearson. 

(On the succession of the earliest Bishops of Rome. Dissert, i. c. 7.) 

a Peter's journey to Rome is proved by Ignatius 
Papias, the Kr?puy,ua rUrpov, Dionysius of Corinth, Ire- 
naeus, Caius, Clement of Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen 5 



298 APPENDIX. 

Cyprian, Lactantius, Eusebius, Athanasius, Epiphanius, 
Julian the Apostate, Augustine and Palladius. So that 
it is strange that persons should have been found to 
deny that Peter ever was at Rome." 

On the words of Ignatius he says : — " For what can 
be more manifest than it is from these words to the 
Romans, that Ignatius must have had an idea that 
Peter proclaimed the gospel (in person) at Rome, and 
was put to death there, as well as Paul?" 

On Papias, he says: — " Papias appears (videtur) to 
attest the same thing in Eusebius, ii. 15, for his testi- 
mony is there added to that of Clemens Alexandrinus, 
about Mark's Gospel having been written at Rome, and 
approved of by Peter there. (De Evangelio Marci 
Romse Scripto, et a Petro Romse approbato.) Papias 
also mentions that Peter's First Epistle was written at 
Rome, and that Babylon in that epistle means Rome. 
.... These points seem to me to establish in the clearest 
manner possible that Peter was at Rome. (Mihi videntur 
validissime stabilire.)" 

On the Kr/puy/ia UsTpov, he says : — " Clemens Alex- 
andrinus frequently mentions this book as an ancient 
document; and in his Stromata (lib. 6) he transcribes 
and explains several of its statements. Now in this 
Kripvyiua Uerpov it was distinctly asserted that Peter 
and Paul proclaimed the Gospel at Rome. For it is so 
I understand (ita interpreter) what Lactantius says in 
his Institutions, iv. 21." 

On Dionysius of Corinth, he remarks: — " This is 
signal evidence of the point in question, and free from 
the least objection. (Omni exceptione majus.) Some of 
the learned, however, have attempted to show its in- 
accuracy." 

He thus concludes : — " As Peter's having proclaimed 
and died at Rome, is stated with so much unanimity 
almost from the first, and as no one ever said that his 
martyrdom took place elsewhere, and as our Lord him- 
self clearly intimates that it was to be by crucifixion, I 
think that we may safely enough attach credit to this 
story, (tuto satis huic historic fidem adhiberi posse 



APPENDIX. 299 

existimo.) For who can believe that so eminent an 
apostle could have died in such obscurity that no one 
should have ever remembered where he died? Who 
can believe that, while other countries claimed, their 
apostles, there was no city, no country, no church, to 
say that it had been ennobled by Peter's blood? .... 
During the last two centuries, however, learned men 
(viri docti) seeing that the advocates of the Papacy 
attached too much importance to this portion of its pre- 
tensions, began at first to have misgivings respecting it, 
and afterwards positively asserted that there was no 
reason for thinking that Peter had ever been at Rome 
at all." 

Note. — 1. He unconsciously betrays how little evidence 
satisfied him on the point in question, when he says 
that it is as " manifest" from what Ignatius says as from 
anything else ; for but few thought the words of Ignatius 
any sign of the thing at all. 2. He was one of those who had 
been led by the papal writers to suppose that the city of 
Babylon did not exist in Peter's day. 3. He also makes 
the usual mistakes about Papias and Mark's Gospel 
4. As a reason for his being satisfied with the evidences 
he adduces, he mentions the circumstance, that if we do 
not infer from them that Peter was put to death in 
Italy, we have no record of where he was put to death 
at all; and how could it have happened that there 
should have been this absence of all record on the sub- 
ject? The answer is, that this is exactly what would 
have happened if Peter had adhered to the Jewish mis- 
sion intrusted to him by our Lord, and had undergone 
his martyrdom at Babylon, as he himself tells us he 
expected soon to do. For it is admitted on all hands, 
that the early records of the church at Babylon have 
been lost, as well as those of almost all the eastern 
churches. 



300 APPENDIX. 

VI. — Baratiee. 

(On the succession of the Bishops of Rome, c. i.) 

This writer considered the thing proved as much as any- 
thing was capable of being proved at all, by the writers 
who preceded Eusebius. He therefore omits the last 
six of Bishop Pearson's references. He adds, however, 
thirteen Antenicene testimonies, which Pearson did not 
think available, and of which there are no less than ten 
that are not mentioned by any previous writers. These 
thirteen are as follows: — Clemens Romanus, the Apo- 
stolic Constitutions, Heracleon, the Recognitions, the 
Clementina or Actus Petri, Hegesippus, Lucius Charinus, 
Victor, an anonymous writer (in Euseb.), Hippolytus, 
Sextus Julius Africanus, Firmilian, and Stephen. 

On the absence of any supposed allusion to Peter's 
having been in Europe in the first century, Baratier 
says, — " I confess that we have not any contempo- 
raneous statement in express terms, of Peter's having 
been at Rome. But it is quite unnecessary that we 
should have been able to produce anything of the kind." 

He also remarks : " How is it that no one contra- 
dicted the person that first set the story going? (Qui 
factum ut nemo eum refutaret?)" 

On Ignatius, he says: — u Why does this writer men- 
tion Peter and Paul in this way together, if it were not 
that they were both at Rome ? Why is Peter mentioned 
at all if he stood in no relation to the church of Rome ? 
For as he did not write to the Romans if he did not live 
in their city, he had no more to do with them — he no 
more 'instructed' them than James, or John, or Judas 
did. It is evident, therefore, that Ignatius believed that 
Peter had been at Rome." 

On the apostle Peter's Kvpvyjua, called in Latin the 
" Prgedicatio Petri," he makes the same remark as Bishop 
Pearson, and adds, " For there can be no doubt that this 
is the work to which Lactantius alludes, (iv. 21,) for 



APPENDIX. 301 

there was none other of that name in the time of Lac- 
tan this, — to say nothing of there being no other then 
generally known or considered as being genuine." 

After mentioning Papias, and all the rest up to the 
times of Papias, Baratier says : u Look at all these testi- 
monies (en multos testes), all flourishing in the very 
commencement of the second century — all living in the 
first age after the apostles ! Who will have the hardihood 
to contradict all these? To them no objection can be 
raised ; for they were neither able to deceive nor to be 
deceived. It is therefore absurd to say, as many have 
done, (quod dicere aggressi sunt multi,) that all the 
subsequent writers drew from Papias alone whatever 
errors they have adopted on this subject." 

Of Victor, whose writings were then known to be lost, 
he says, that the testimony he had to produce from him 
was some of the most satisfactory that was to be met 
with anywhere, and introduces it with the words, " Pro- 
pero itaque ad gravissimum testimonium," (I go on, 
therefore, at once to that which is among the most im- 
portant proofs of all.) After he cites it, he adds: 
" Manifestum itaque est Petrum Romae fuisse," (there 
can therefore be no doubt that Peter was at Rome. ) The 
reader will see from the section of this work upon Victor, 
what Baratier calls most satisfactory testimony. 

Baratier concludes thus: "Peter's Roman journey, 
therefore, is a public event which could not be feigned, 
and which it was in nobody's interest to feign ; which 
squares in perfectly with the statements of contempo- 
raneous writers, and is even indicated by some of them ; 
which, after the first century, is mentioned by all who 
require to mention it, (quibus de eo loquendi occasio 
fuit,) which, in the subsequent centuries, was admitted 
by all writers, and was never questioned in ancient days 
by anybody. If this is not sufficient for historical 
certainty, I do not see what there is that we can now 
call certain." 

This writer has a section (sec. vi.) on what he calls 
the " Fable, or Fiction about Peter's Five-and- Twenty 



302 APPENDIX. 

years, and the origin of it," (Fabula de xxv. annis Petri, 
ej usque origo.) 

Note. — The extreme confidence with which young 
Baratier draws his inferences, and cites nearly a dozen 
works, known by the Roman Catholics to be interpolated, 
spurious, or lost, and therefore not even mentioned by any 
of them, might lead a reader versed in such matters to 
fancy that he was making a jest of the whole business, 
and caricaturing the arguments of the Roman clergy. 
This, however, there is every reason to think, is not the 
case ; although it is difficult to see how the thing could 
have been more effectually or cleverly done. 



VII.— Correspondent in the " Times." 

{Times for January 16, 1851.) 

To the Editor of the Times. " Sir, — In reply to your 
several correspondents upon this subject, I beg to refer 
them to the following authorities : — 

" That St. Peter before he went to Rome founded the 
See of Antioch is attested by Eusebius, Chron. and Hist. 
1. 3 c. 30 ; Origen, Horn. 6 in Luc. ; St. Jerome, in Catal. 
c. 1: St. Innocent, Ep. 18 t. 2 cone. p. 1269; Pope 
Galasius, in his Roman Council, cone. t. 4, p. 1262; St. 
Chrysostom, and others. 

" That St. Peter founded the church at Rome is ex- 
pressly asserted by Caius, apud Eus. lib. 2 c. 24 alias 25, 
a priest of Rome under Pope Zephyrinus, a.d. 202 ad 218, 
who relates that his body was then (buried) on the 
Vatican Hill, and that of St. Paul on the Ostian Road. 
That Saints Peter and Paul were crowned with martyr- 
dom at Rome is affirmed by Dionysius, Bishop of Corinth, 
in the second age. St. Irenaeus, who lived in the same 
age, calls the church at Rome " the greatest and most 
ancient church, founded by the two glorious apostles, St. 
Peter and St. Paul. Eusebius in several places, 1. 2, 
c. 13 and 15, &c, mentions St. Peter being at Rome and 

THE SEVERAL IMPORTANT TRANSACTIONS of this apostle in 



APPENDIX. 303 

that city. The fact is also mentioned by Origen, Hege- 
sippus, Arnobius, St. Ambrose, St. Austin, St. Jerome, 
and several others. St. Cyprian, Ep. 55, ad Cornel, pap., 
calls Rome the Chair of St. Peter. Theodoret, lib. 2, 
c. 1 7, calls it his Throne, which the general councils and 
ecclesiastical writers through every age, and on every 
occasion, repeat. 

" Eusebius, Euseb. in Chron., St. Jerome, and the old 
Roman Calendar published by Bucherius, say that St. 
Peter held the See of Rome twenty-five years, though he 
was often absent upon his apostolic functions in other 
countries. According to this chronology, St. Peter 
arrived in Rome in the second year of the reign of Clau- 
dius; of Christ, forty-two. Lactantius mentions only 
his last coming to Rome, under Nero, a few years before 
his martyrdom. (Lactant. deMort. Persec.) See Baluze 
and Ceillier, t. 1. To come down to later times, Whis- 
ton, in the Memoirs of his own Life (p. 599), writes as 
follows: — i Mr. Bower, with some weak Protestants 
before him, almost pretends to deny that St. Peter ever 
was at Rome, concerning which matter take my own former 
words out of my three tracts (p. 53). Mr. Baratier proves 
most thoroughly, as Bishop Pearson has done before 
him, that St. Peter was at Rome. This is so clear in 
Christian antiquity, that it is a shame for a Protestant 
to confess that any Protestant ever denied it.' Mr. 
Baratier, a Protestant divine, printed at Utrecht, in 
1740, his Chronological Inquiry about the Most Ancient 
Bishops of Rome, from Peter to Victor, in which he 
demonstrates that St. Peter was at Rome, as Bishop 
Pearson had done before by a learned dissertation in his 
posthumous works. Apologizing for the length of this 
letter, " I am, Sir, yours obediently, 

" London, Jan. 15." " TRUTH." 

Note. — 1. The first paragraph only regards Antioch. 
Baronius informs us, that Peter founded that church 
while he was at Jerusalem, in the same way as he founded 
so many other churches. The Correspondent is mis- 



304 APPENDIX. 

taken, therefore, in thinking that we have any means of 
learning from the writers he quotes whether Peter was 
or was not at Antioch. It is from the New Testament 
alone that we learn this. Yet, strange to say, this is 
not mentioned as one of the credible sources of informa- 
tion cited upon this subject by the Correspondent in the 
Times. 2. As this writer does not agree with Cardinal 
Baronius and the rest of the Roman clergy, that a church 
might have been founded by Peter without Peter's pre- 
sence, and by Paul without Paul's presence, he of course 
draws the usual erroneous inference from the words 
of Caius and Irenseus. 3. This is the only writer 
who ever fancied that it was in several places that 
Eusebius supposed Peter to have left the East, which 
Eusebius does in only one; or that Eusebius alludes any- 
where to what this writer so unaccountably calls u the 
important transactions" of that apostle. 4. For the 
supposed martyrdom in Europe, he considers the passage 
from Dionysius as the best testimony that his church 
possesses, and gives no other. 5. Origen, it will be re- 
membered, is only cited by Eusebius as mentioning Paul. 
6. Hegesippus, as has been seen, has not left one word 
either about Paul or Peter. 7. Arnobius, St. Ambrose, 
St. Austin (Augustine), and St. Jerome, are likewise 
supposed by this writer to allude to the " important 
transactions ;" but none of these Fathers make Europe the 
scene of the allegory with which they are connected. 
8. St. Gildas, calling Canterbury Peter's Chair in the 
sixth century ; Optatus, calling Carthage Peter's Chair 
in the fourth century; and Cyprian, calling Rome so in 
the third, do not prove Peter to have been in any of 
these places. It may be asked, therefore, why the Cor- 
respondent in the Times mentions this as a proof of 
Peter's having been at Rome. We cannot suppose that 
he meant to deceive. Will he inform us what he did 
mean by the quotation? 9. " Throne," in the Greek 
Fathers, has the same sense attached to it as " Chair." 
It does not imply presence, although Rome, by the same 
Theodoret here quoted, was called "Paul's Throne," 



APPENDIX. 305 

u Paul's Chair," and the " See of St. Paul." This ex- 
pression is so used in all such eases, without any reference 
to Paul's presence in that city, nor does it imply his being 
local bishop of that church. 10. The passage here, about 
the hypothesis of the Five-and-Twenty years is copied 
verbatim out of Butler's " Lives of the Saints," which 
proves that the writer made no researches of his own 
upon the subject of it. Not one word of it, however, 
is correct. Eusebius nowhere makes the statement 
imputed to him, and his Chronicon is lost. Jerome no- 
where makes it in his own works, and his translations 
from Eusebius are admitted by the Roman clergy to be 
full of errors of all kinds. The old Roman Calendar 
does not say Peter ever on any occasion left the East, 
but the reverse. The Roman clergy themselves admit 
that this story of the five-and-twenty years was an 
invention or mistake; and not, perhaps, more than 
three or four writers (of course very modern) pretend to 
say that it was often that Peter went into Italy. 
11. Father Palma, of the Propaganda at Rome, could 
have informed this writer that the work " De Mortibus 
Persecutorum" was not written by Lactantius, has not 
been even supposed for centuries to have been written 
by him, and was never known, or even heard of, by 
name until the seventeenth century ; all which is fully 
admitted by the Father Ceillier, whom this writer, 
under some infatuation or misconception, cites to prove 
the contrary. 12. As far as a modern opinion on the 
general question can be of any use to him, this writer is 
entitled to Whiston's support, such as it is. But as to 
Peter's mission to the Jews of the East, and as to his 
having been crucified with his head downwards at Baby- 
lon, as he expected, we accept Whiston's words : " This 
is so clear in Christian antiquity, that it is a shame for a 
Protestant to confess that any Protestant (or for a Roman 
Catholic to confess that any Roman Catholic, for, a 
fortiori, he must have meant this also) ever denied it." 
13. The church of Rome does not hold that Peter's 
" body" was ever buried on the Vatican Hill. One half 

x 



306 APPENDIX. 

of it, as well as the head, was always thought to be on 
the Ostian Road, by those Roman Catholics who thought 
it was at Rome at all. 14. Caius says that Peter had a 
tomb on the Ostian Road as well as on the Vatican Hill, 
but does not say what relics were in it, nor whether there 
were any in either of his tombs. 



VIII.— Father J. S. M c Corry. 

(In his Tract, " Was St. Peter ever at Borne?" Dolman, London, 1851.) 

" The first witness that we shall bring forward is Cle- 
ment the Roman, a disciple of St. Peter. After the 
persecution of Dioclesian had subsided, he wrote an 
Epistle to the Corinthians, in which he speaks of those 
who had suffered martyrdom at Rome, and makes dis- 
tinct mention of St. Peter as the great bishop who had 

POUNDED AND GOVERNED THE ROMAN CHURCH. He Says : 

c Let us always have before our eyes those good apostles ; 
Peter, who endured so many labours, and who, dying a 
martyr, departed to glory ; and Paul, who obtained the 
reward of patience, and suffered martyrdom under the 
emperors. To these men who led so angelic a life, a vast 
multitude of the elect were added, who, rivalling one 
another in suffering, reproaches, and torments, have left 
behind them, for our sake, the most beautiful example/ 
Now here is a declaration from a contemporary writer, 
bearing evidence to the fact that the prince of the apostles 
died a martyr at Rome. Surely such a testimony must 

SPEAK VOLUMES. 

" Our second witness is Ignatius. When led to mar- 
tyrdom, about the year 105, he wrote a letter to the 
Romans, entreating them not to prevent, by their prayers, 
the fulfilment of his desire, (to suffer martyrdom. ) He 
begins thus : 4 Ignatius to the sanctified church that pre- 
sides in the country of the Romans, — I do not command 
you, as Peter and Paul ; they were apostles ; I am an 
insignificant person.' Now this proves that the Romans 
had been taught by St. Peter and St. Paul, and had re- 
ceived their c commands,' and of course shows that both 
apostles had been at Rome. 



APPENDIX. 307 

u Our third witness is Papias. Papias tells us (in 
Eusebius) that Mark records in his Gospel what he had 
heard from St. Peter at Rome ; and he, moreover, 
tells us, that St. Peter wrote his Epistle from Kome, 
calling it by the mystic appellation of Babylon. The 
words of Papias are : ' Which Epistle of Peter was written 
at Kome, although he calls that city by the name of 
Babylon!' 

" The fourth witness is Irenseus. He says :— 4 As it 
would be very tedious to enumerate in this volume the 
successions of all the churches, we shall confound our 
adversaries by referring to that church which is the 
greatest, the most venerable, and universally known, — 
that church founded and established by the two most 
glorious apostles, Peter and Paul.' Again, he adds, — 
' St. Matthew wrote his Gospel among the Jews, in the 
Hebrew tongue. Peter and Paul preached at Kome 
and founded the church there.' 

" The fifth witness is Dionysius of Corinth. He 
says, — c Peter and Paul having both come into our city 
of Corinth, and having instructed us in the doctrine of 
Christianity, went forth to Italy, and instructed you 
also, Romans, and suffered martyrdom at the same 
time.' 

" The sixth witness is Caius — a Koman — whose 
words are peculiarly touching. He declares : — c I can 
point out to you the trophies of the apostles Peter 
and Paul. For whether you direct your footsteps to 
the Vatican, or to the Ostian Way, the trophies of those 
who founded the Koman church present themselves to 
your view.' 

" The seventh witness is Tertullian. His testimony 
is exceedingly telling. ' Ista quam felix Ecclesia ! — 
church, peculiarly happy, into which the apostles poured 
forth their whole doctrine with their blood. Where 
Peter was crucified, like his Divine Master ; and Paul, 
like the Baptist, was beheaded ; where John the 
Apostle (after having been thrown into a caldron of 
seething oil) came forth unhurt, and was banished to 
the island.' 



308 ■ APPENDIX. 

" The eighth witness is Origen : — ' Peter is thought to 
have preached to the Jews who were dispersed through 
Pontus, Galatia, Bithynia, Cappadocia and Asia. He 
afterwards came to Rome, and was nailed to a cross 
with his head towards the ground.' 

" The ninth witness is Optatus of Milevi. Arguing 
with a Donatist adversary he says : — 4 You cannot deny 
that you know that the Chair of Peter, first of alfcwas 
fixed in, the city of Rome, in which Peter, the head of 

all the apostles, sat Peter first sat in that Chair, 

and was succeeded by Linus.' 

" The tenth witness is Eusebius, who says : — c During 
the reign of Claudius, Peter came to Rome, by the 
providence of God.' Again, he says in his Chronicon, 
4 Peter having founded the church at Antioch, came to 
Rome, where he preached the gospel, and was bishop of 
that city for twenty -five years.' 

u The eleventh witness is Orosius, who writes: — = 
' Claudius governed fourteen years ; at the beginning of 
his reign Peter came to Rome.' 

" Oar twelfth witness is St. Jerome, who in his Cata- 
logue of Ecclesiastical Writers, thus speaks : — ' Simon 
Peter, after having governed the church at Antioch, 
came to Rome in the second year of Claudius. He put 
to shame Simon Magus there, and governed the Roman 
church for twenty-five years; when in the fourteenth 
year of Nero he was crowned with martyrdom.' In the 
same work he tells us : ' His body was buried at Rome 
in the Yatican, near the Triumphal Way ; and his feast 
is celebrated by the veneration of the whole city.' Ap- 
propriately to this subject, we may remark that the 
illustrious orator of Constantinople, St. John Chrys- 
ostom, while discoursing on the Last Judgment, bursts 
out into a most eloquent apostrophe, alluding to St. 
Peter's tomb at Rome. 

" We may finally refer to Arnobius, who distinctly 
tells us that Simon Peter exposed the diabolical arti- 
fices of Simon Magus at Rome, to Hegesippus, to Cyril 
of Jerusalem, to St. Ambrose, to St. Augustine, and to 
many other writers of unexceptionable character. It 



APPENDIX. - 309 

would seem, however, an idle parade of research to bring 
forward any more testimonies from the ancient writers, 
whether from the first, second, third, or fourth centuries, 
corroborative of our position, and altogether superfluous 
to indulge in any lengthened comments on those already 
adduced." 

On 1 Peter, v. 13, he says, page 5 : — " The word 
Babylon, used in that epistle, all the ancient Fathers 
understand to be Rome." And again, page 29 : " All 
the old writers understand the word ' Babylon,' here used 
by St. Peter, to mean Rome ; and they assign various 
reasons why he gave the ancient city of Rome that 
designation. The historians to whom I refer are Papias, 
Clement of Alexandria, Eusebius, and others, whom it 
is not necessary to mention. The great ecclesiastical 
historian, Eusebius, distinctly tells us that St. Peter 
called Rome by the name Babylon, because it was 
then the centre of pagan idolatry ! Dollinger writes : 
1 All the Fathers understand the word Babylon, used in 
St. Peter's Epistle, to signify Rome. The Jews had 
been driven from Babylon and Seleucia a short time 
previous to the writing of this Epistle ; and we cannot 
suppose that St. Peter, the Apostle or the Circum- 
cision, SHOULD TRAVEL TO SO DISTANT A CITY, IN WHICH 

he could find none of his nation/ We, moreover, 
contend that . . . Babylon of the Assyrians had long 
since fallen." 

Note. — 1. The translations of this writer are in- 
valuable, as showing to what lengths a few of the Roman 
clergy now among us go, and are obliged to go, upon 
this subject and these passages. Some of the more 
remarkable words and clauses are here indicated by 
capitals. 2. He is one of those who are so much 
misled as to what the Fathers have said of Mark's 
Gospel. He thinks they said it was composed in Europe, 
under Peter's surveillance, and that even Papias tells us 
this. 3. He makes great use of the word u preached" 
instead of " promulgated " or " proclaimed," as a trans- 
lation of Kripv^ag ; and makes the usual inferences from 
this expression ; and from the apostles' founding a church 






310 APPENDIX. >££ 

in one city while they were stationed in another, 4. He 
is mistaken in supposing that Caius, in the only passage 
that we have of his, mentions the name of either Peter 
or Paul. There is nothing of the kind in the text. 5. 
The Latin word quoted by Father M c Corry, to assist the 
construction he places upon Tertullian's passage, is not 
in any MS*, and no Eoman-catholic editor pretends it is. 
6. He states, as if casually, that St. Jerome said a por- 
tion (from other sources we learn one-half) of Peter's 
relics were, in Jerome's day, supposed to be on the 
Vatican Hill. He does not, however, say that relics in 
a city make it probable that a saint was put to death 
there. All the Eoman clergy know that no such in- 
ference could be drawn, however likely the uninitiated 
are to fall into this mistake. 7. He says that Hegesippus 
and the rest of the Fathers mention the diabolical 
artifices of the Samaritan as having occurred in 
Europe. In this he is quite mistaken. Not one of them 
mention even the Fiery Chariot as having occurred 
there. The pseudo-Hegesippus, who took it from 
Jacobus de Voragine, and from the pseudo-Abdias, 
appears to have deceived him. 8. He is also mis- 
taken in thinking that all the Fathers, or a few of the 
Fathers, or even one of the Fathers, thought that when 
Peter wrote " the city of Babylon" he meant the city of 
Kome. This writer seems to have taken too many 
things upon trust from other authors; and yet, about 
Peter's being supposed to have gone to Rome, we cor- 
dially accept the principle that he quotes from Father 
Dollenger — " We cannot suppose that St. Peter, the 
Apostle of the Circumcision, should travel to so 

DISTANT A CITY IN WHICH HE COULD FIND NONE OF HIS 

nation." Rome was four times as far from Jerusalem 
as Babylon was, and frequently had no Jews at all in it. 



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